jay morgans: completely wordinary

Testing

2007-07-25T11:30:00.001-05:00

Testing

how long has it been?

2007-06-11T12:07:00.000-05:00

i wonder how it ends up this way
wonder why you left me behind my friend
funny how my life seems to end
by the way
how long has it been?

wonder why this takes me away
but i swear nothing takes your place my friend
pull it back and just beyond my grasp again
by the way
how long has it been?

i can see your light as it's coming down on me
but i can't change all the time between us
and i spend my life by your side
hold you when you fall
my eyes welling up again
how long has it been?

little child, there is solace in these thoughts you'll find
that i can't forget the piece of me that's you
far away, and backing further, back away
so i'm lost until once again i spend my days
with you

i can see your light as it's coming down on me
but i can't change all the time between us
and i spend my life by your side
hold you when you fall
my eyes welling up again
how long has it been?

wonder why the pain must come again
wonder why you left me behind my friend
wonder why my life seemed to end
by the way
how long has it been?

me and jesus

2007-04-15T01:36:00.000-05:00

i told jesus to go to hell
and surprisingly
woke up with holes in my hands
a cut on my side
and one hell of a righteous crown

i must say that i tried to run
but fell three times
a cross on my back
(and simon just stood there and laughed)

i met these three ladies
on my stroll to the hill
and they were all distressed
to see me in my sorry state
(and calling me some sort of king)

one came forth to wash my face
and i made that shroud so holy

but the image i left was not my own

not even rain

2007-04-15T01:28:00.000-05:00

sentimental foolish boy
turning into a sentimental man
and the foolish games he plays
she holds them in her hands

a sophisticated girl
almost nothing more than a child
and there's nothing that she hates like him
and his wicked eyes and smile

and the whole world saw his face
as he quickly turned it away
he turned it away
she said "we've seen some better days..."
as they quietly fell from grace
they fell from grace

and he fell over his own words
they were words he created to fall
but he fell
and she waited for one last touch
for the touch that she wanted
to feel what he felt
and she felt what he felt

here they held their laughter up against their deepest fears
and smiling laughed and said "not even rain can touch us here"
here they closed their eyes
smiling holding back their tears
and shaking laughed and said "not even rain can touch us here"

and she'd never speak a word
of what she saw in his eyes
that made that woman a girl
and made that girl a child

and he'll never hold like that
and he'll never be understood
and no one can give that place to hide
at least not like she could

and the whole world helped him lay in the quiet place she made
he said "we've seen some better days..."
and she quietly fell from grace

and he fell over his own words
they were words he created to fall
but he fell
and she waited for one last touch
for the touch that she wanted
to feel what he felt
and she felt what he felt

here they held their laughter up against their deepest fears
and smiling laughed and said "not even rain can touch us here"
here they closed their eyes
smiling holding back their tears
and shaking laughed and said "not even rain can touch us here"

and now they're memories
and memory is the only way how not even rain can touch them now

let me go on

2007-01-27T22:49:00.000-05:00

i'm thirteen
but i feel i'm so much older
stepfather likes to teach with his hand
i'm so shy
but i'm getting so much bolder
doing things that no one else can understand

i don't want it
no i just need some time away
i don't need your saviors or sins
there's nothing left for me here
i've got no reason to stay

i cry out in my sleep when i'm not so alseep
there's something down there that wants me, i know
it's been so long since i felt this growing aching need
but this stupid town won't let me go

i don't want it
no i just need some time away
i don't need your saviors or sins
there's nothing left for me here
i've got no reason to stay

let me go on
let me go on
it's been far too long
far too long

i'm dressed up because it's as close to expression as anyone down here is going to get
we're still trapped
and we're all just only guessing
and this town is going to drag us down yet

i don't want it
no i just need some time away
i don't need your saviors or sins
there's nothing left for me here
i've got no reason to stay

i've been hurt
and i know i've done some hurting
and sometimes it pulls apart at the seams
i'm so gone and my friends are getting worried
say i'm spending too much time on these dreams

i don't want it
no i just need some time away
i don't need your saviors or sins
there's nothing left for me here
i've got no reason to stay

let me go on
let me go on
it's been far too long
far too long

regrets, i guess i can't say that i have none
but something tells me that i'll be all right
something tells me i'm gonna be all right

know love

2007-01-27T22:28:00.000-05:00

my sister
she was raped by a black man
i didn't think it mattered, the color of his skin
but some people thought that it should
she said "father, forgive them, they know not what they do..."

and i knew then that she knew love better than they could
i knew then that she just knew love better than they could

i saw a boy about 6, quiet, serene
playing jacks in the park
some kids came down from up the hill
started fucking with him because he was dark
i broke it all up before it could start
i looked into his eyes and i could see his broken heart
i took his hand in mine
asked "what can i do?"
he said "paint me up white so i can be like them and you."

what else could i say?
i said "you don't want that"

there was a man down my street
he had funny ideas
and he talked to himself. a lot.
one night around ten he was sitting on a bench doing nothing
and he found himself shot
his eyes stayed wise but he never walked again
he said, "they took nice cents... it was all that i had"
and when i asked him how he really felt about that
he said "they must have needed it bad"

and i knew then that he knew love better than i could
i knew then that he just knew love better than i could

unfinished 637

2007-01-27T22:24:00.000-05:00

and now we sleep
how much of this was a dream?
and now i raise my head from the earth that was my bed
but i won't let the night penetrate me

so hush baby
it's just the wind that's calling to me
and i promise not to follow
i'll still be here tomorrow
don't waste your thoughts on the likes of me

lost or found?
i don't believe you still come around
if a tree fell south in the forests of your mouth
i still don't think you'd make any sound

the phantom of the living room

2007-01-27T22:20:00.000-05:00

how'd you make me fall away?
forget about the choices that we made
the way we laughed and played
now push me off and call me names

naked now and so afraid
though i may seem big i feel so small
did you notice that at all?
i feel so small...

and now you've seen my face again
and said i'm ugly
and now you've seen my face again
i leave it to you where to go from here
where to go...

slap the face again
i guess it's my fault for leaving it there
all i ever needed was a friend
somebody show me someone cares

is there anybody out there?
is there truly anybody ever really out there?
i don't know and i don't care
i never liked phys. ed. anyway

and now you've seen my face again
and said i'm ugly
and now you've seen my face again
i leave it to you where to go from here
where to go...

like a child

2007-01-27T20:18:00.000-05:00

i remember the days, but moreso the nights
i remember the chill
that white winter bite

i remember the fire set so deep in your eyes
i remember the way you looked just like a child

but if i could go back,
what could i say?

it was more like some severity
split and drawn and you severed me
and i can't forget how i hit my knees
that night i smashed your picture
and i screamed and i screamed and i screamed

i threw the phone and the phone was dead
so i hit the walls with my fists and head
and i wouldn't sleep
for the things i dread would find me in my empty bed
my bleeding hands
my aching head

but if i could go back,
what could i say?

just stay for a while
like an icicle slide further in to this heavy-eyed child
just never believe the things that you see
when you peel back the skin
it can never be if you think what you see is me

untitled

2006-12-29T18:04:00.000-05:00

you of extra-ordinary
beautygrace; you of evil descent
you will not leave me to my rooms
for thought or reflection,
you will not taste upon my cheeks
the salted rivers of desire
or regret.

you will not tear through any piece of me
with you right eye
or your left,
nor will you intrude upon my softer dreaming
with anything delicate about your face,
the lips especially.

you will not change my view on humanity,
you will not prod me towards any sort
of belief i've previously dis-proved

or,
then

you might.

~jay morgans

unabridged

2006-12-29T18:02:00.000-05:00

her tongue knows how
to speak pleasure
onto skin
and comfort
to a penitent ear.

the words,
much like the licking,
are alive and
dancing
some sort of
celebration.

and her face---
it has more definition
than
Webster's 10th.

~jay morgans

the morgans project mp3s

2006-05-20T01:28:00.000-05:00

i've been uploading a few mp3s to the site. old ones so far.

All The King's Horses by Jay Morgans

2006-04-14T02:13:00.000-05:00

All The King's Horses by Jay Morgans

Graphitti Designs

2006-04-12T22:25:00.000-05:00

Graphitti Designs

Qwerty Maniac - The Typo Killer » Blog Archive » Disabling useless services and speeding up your computer

2006-04-11T16:36:00.000-05:00

Qwerty Maniac - The Typo Killer » Blog Archive » Disabling useless services and speeding up your computer

end

2006-03-27T15:35:00.000-05:00

dear friendship,
what a tight little group we make here at school
i'm that one
and you're one too
i can tell just when i look at you
it's different when they look at you

dear teacher,
don't think i have forgotten that last crime
that you inflicted upon my very fragile and delicate person
it's not right
it was not right
it could not be even in your best light
what you did
it wasn't right
no it wasn't right

dear father,
where were you last night?
i was looking for you
it seems i couldn't sleep
and i waited
frustrated
stared at the walls for hours
and you never left me anything but your genes

i couldn't be who i've always tried to be
no matter how hard i tried
and i couldn't see the things you wanted me to be
i couldn't see through your eyes
i couldn't wait for the years to come to pass
these lessons we all must learn
i tried so hard
i let it fall away
i couldn't be
i couldn't be more than hurt

dear mother,
i'm watching myself turn into something
i'm not quite sure what
i know you
and i see you look at me
like i'm something you've never seen before
or ever since me
how'd you let me go so far
it's not your fault but it's not my fault
how'd you let me slip so far
i tried to be something more than i am

i couldn't be who i've always tried to be
no matter how hard i tried
i know you're hurt
it all comes from me before
but this time i swear i'll try
i wanted you to see me for something i might be
or i might grow to be
you couldn't see
you couldn't see through me
i tried
please see through me

dear sister,
do you remember that game we used to play
when i'd lay you out upon the railroad tracks
and whistle for the train
i do
i remember just like it was yesterday
or maybe it was
i guess it could've been yesterday

i see you when you stare
what, did you expect me to care?
well i don't
because i've got mine
i never asked for any of these things
that you lay upon my brow
i'd love to take but i don't know how

hey bretheran,
i see you
you used to be something i thought i wanted to be
but i never had the strength to be
i still look towards you for respect and admiration
i give unto you
do you give it back to me to?
you're my own
and i know this
it's nothing anyone could come between
below or above me
we're something that i don't know
i've never seen the likes of this before
i think i might even call it love

i couldn't be who i've always tried to be
no matter how hard i tried
and i wanted you to see me for these things i am
not just the look in my eyes
i've wanted you
i wanted to become something much better than i might be
i've wanted you for so long
it makes me wonder how should i be?
do you want to tell me how i should be?
because i'm no good at me...

hey father,
can you see me now?
look at these things you've done
i'm writhing on your floor
just like you did the night before
and i'm looking
and i'm waiting
yeah i'm lost
maybe i'm frustrated
but i will not fold
like you taught me to fold
you taught me two-fold

you can't tell me i'm wrong
would you like me to sing you a song?
i hope you'd sing along
because i know now i'm not alone
like i thought i was so alone
hey, everyone thinks they're alone

hey i now have these thoughts
and now i have these dreams
and i'm looking for answers
do you think you could tell me what it means?
i'd like to know what this could mean
i'd like to learn more than how to bleed

hey mother,
look at me now
i'm sorry if i frightened you that morning
you shouldn't have to find me this way
i tried to lock my door
i figured...
i don't know what i figured
guess i could just call it a mistake
i guess i'll say it's a mistake

i couldn't be who i've always tried to be
no matter how hard i've tried
i wanted this for so long
it makes me wonder
if i really want to die
i don't look back
i don't look towards you for comfort
i know it's more than you can give
i tell you now
i didn't want it to be like this
i swear i just wanted to live
don't we all want to live?
i won't forget you i won't forget you for this

i couldn't be who i've always tried to be
no matter how hard i've tried
now look at me
tell me what you see inside me
what is it you see inside?
i wanted you
wanted to tell you these things
before it was too late to decide
it's over now
just take one look at me
i'll tell you to view everything with my eyes

i couldn't be who i've always tried to be
no matter how hard i've tried
i've wanted you for so long
it makes me wonder do i really want to die?
i'll tell you now the things i never tried to tell you
i guess i know i tried
i wanted you to leave me behind
i'm lost and not worth this long ride

~jay morgans

seven

2006-03-27T15:34:00.000-05:00

i hear your voices
multiple personalities
they give me choices
like run or lose or bleed
but i don't mind it so much when i'm with you
i don't seem so angry
i lose my attitude
i think i gave it to you

i couldn't sleep last night
i laid awake and i cried and cried
and when i found my sleeping eyes
i dreamed a dream of how i died
i couldn't sleep last night
i laid awake and i cried and cried
you should be happy with yourself

you live like i die
you laugh while i cry
i choked while you drank yourself to sleep that night
and when it gets this tight
i'm afraid i might
and i'm afraid i might

these dreams i'm having
the doctors say i'm not right
meds and arts and crafts
to get me through the night

i'm not bending inward
i'm not losing any ground
i'm whistling at the gentleman as he makes his rounds

it's honor and persuasion
perseverence and good luck
not one but seven minds
veiled and true and stuck

percussive sawing
watch me swing away
watch the sky from windows
watching the sky fade

i couldn't sleep last night
i laid awake and i cried and cried
and when i found my sleeping eyes
i dreamed a dream that we both just died

i couldn't breathe last night
the air escaped but i tried and tried
i'll take you in
but it'll take some time
i'll trade you back my spine and mind

i'll trade you back
just let me fade away

~jay morgans

cloudsuncloudrain

2006-03-27T15:33:00.000-05:00

i've got a girlfriend
angel and godsend
shrewbitchdykewhorewench
she slept with my best friend

i've got a neighbor
he thinks he's the savior
i try to shut him out
he punched me in my mouth

i'm tired of my life
cloudsuncloudrain
i think this world's insane

i've got a tv
i'm on its currency
it steals my energy
last night it tried to kill me

i've got a teacher
son of a preacher
he calls me lucky joe
no one will fuck me though

i'm tired of my life
cloudsuncloudrain
i think this world's insane

i've got a girlfriend, angel and godsend
she tells me once again that she is my only friend
i've got a girlfriend, angel and godsend
she tears me once again
she is my only friend

i'm tired of my life
cloudsuncloudrain
i think this world's in vain

~jay morgans

mantra for strength upon leaving a love

2006-03-27T15:32:00.001-05:00

i don't want to be your friend no more
i don't want to be your child no more
i don't want to be your lover no more
i'm tired of the fighting
what's the fighting for?

i don't want to be your enemy
i don't want to be your anything
i'm tired of the fighting
what's the fighting mean?

chained from the back in a one-inch cell
you don't care how or what i felt

~jay morgans

clean

2006-03-27T15:32:00.000-05:00

...and i remember everything
i remember you were here with me
in an instant i’m not here anymore
water wash me
wash me clean
save me from this hot disease
i don’t wanna be sick anymore

i remember that you came to me
we fell like rain like dying leaves
it ended like it was just a dream
i woke up as if from dreaming
it was all like nothing else before
it was all like nothing else before
which hand do you want more?

i hope somewhere i’m in your head
remember me so sweetly
the way i felt before i fell
remember nothing else could be me

did i frighten you?
i’m sorry if i frightened you

~jay morgans

papa's coming home

2006-03-27T15:31:00.000-05:00

he had a 9 mm. and a beat-up cadillac
he says "in this world there ain’t no going back"
he rolls the window down wide and lights another cigarette
that rearview mirror ain’t seen nothing yet

and i was standing by the door
and i could hear my mother praying
and he knelt down on the floor
so we could talk face to face
and he took me by the hand
and he said, "don’t be afraid
i don’t love you any less
you’re just standing in my way"

it’s all right
papa’s coming home
that’s my boy
papa’s coming home soon
so soon

and he tried to teach me well
about barstool etiquette
and i damn near learned with what little i had left
and i try to understand that once the bottle took the man
there was a deeper motivation that was out of his hands

but i woke up last night
and i think i called his name
and i wondered if he left out of hope or out of shame
he never needed an excuse that i didn’t supply
but if i had my chance now
i’d pin him to the ground and ask him why

it’s all right
papa’s coming home
it’s all right now child
papa’s coming home

~jay morgans

secrets

2006-03-27T15:30:00.000-05:00

secrets

it's six o'clock and the clock won't stop
so neither will i
i'll save my sleeping for another time
i've been waiting awake since yesterday sometime
listening to the clock tick
no i don't want to miss another sunrise

but no one's waiting for me anyway
no one's answering the prayers i've prayed
no one's holding my head
there's work to be done
there's mouths to be fed

"i'll be home soon..." is all she said

i touch my face
on my face i taste the salt of my tears
i can't erase the last sixteen years
i've been staring in space since yesterday
now i'm listening to the wind
blow secrets no one else knows
the secrets are mine

but no one's waiting for me anyway
no one's answering the prayers i've prayed
and i'm so easily led
i'm wasting my time
i'm losing my head

"i'll be home soon..." is all she said

the secrets i have for her
now i can never tell

upon the wind i send my farewell

~jay morgans

cold

2006-03-27T15:29:00.000-05:00

cold

i can't take this mockery
wrapped up in your scenery
and i don't think you understand
this is what's occurred to me:
you're pretty people with pretty things
and i don't think you understand
do you understand?

no need for apologies
but what i see is what i see
and i don't think you understand
all is true when nothing's real
i won't speak and i won't feel
no i don't feel

and if you see me fading out
please know i did everything i did for you

you put me out that night
and no,
i don't think excuses hold
did you know i was so cold?
no money, hope, or place to go
no one holds the things i hold
i didn't know this world was so cold
and in a world so cold
you're what i hold

~jay morgans

mary magdalene

2006-03-27T15:28:00.000-05:00

mary magdalene

little mary magdalene
jesus save me from my sins

hail jesus
hail the savior
bathe in holy water
leave the church
penance is over
you’ve said your our fathers
will you take of the body?
will you take of the blood?
will you bathe yourself in the river mud?
oh god please cleanse me of my sins

little mary magdalene
you’re so beautiful with your precious hair
devastatingly wondrous
you’re beauty with a cross to bear
stigmatic dreams of a crucifix
a tear-stained pillow of holy bliss
reconciled sins coming back to you

and one day jesus will forgive you
i only wish i could too

genuflecting on the chapel floor
fold your hands and you preach your faith
let me tell you
little girl
bruised knees won’t get you through heaven’s gates
rosary beads for you and your friends
is jesus coming?
will he save you again?
wash his feet with your perfumed tears

you’re sacred and you’re holy
you find protection in your church
but your fallacy’s getting stronger
and your soul, it's getting worse
little frightened girl
seek protection from your own world
now how can you say you believe?

little mary magdalene
jesus save me from my sins

lord wash away my inequities
and cleanse me of my sins
let’s have a moment of silence
let’s have a moment of prayer
for little mary magdalene

~jay morgans

tonight

2006-03-27T15:27:00.000-05:00

tonight

she held it like it was her own
but she was gone before i ever knew
it’s me that’s curled up and alone
just like i’m the sole devotion of you
and she kissed my head
and it was as if i’d never been kissed before
and even if i had
i don’t need that

but i wonder what she’s doing tonight
and i wonder if she made it all right

and to this place that i once called my home
i bid a fond farewell to you all
we stood together
now we stand alone
we stood together like alone we fall
and i left behind
and it was as if i’d never been there before
but even if i had
i don’t need that

but i wonder what they’re doing tonight
and i wonder which way is goodbye

and she sings
"li di di di di la da di di di di di
take these tired wings upon the summer wind and fly"

and i could wish that i could say that
but i can’t fall or cry for you anymore

~jay morgans

wordinary

2006-03-26T17:12:00.000-05:00

i invented a new word to insult myself with, and, with nothing better to do, took it a step further and submitted this to wiktionary.org and urbandictionary.com:

Wordinary

"Wordinary" was coined by entertainment writer Jay Morgans to describe poor written or verbal skills by personalities with a false sense of intelligence or wit. It is often categorized by the circular verbiage or cliche ideas.

Also, "wordinaries," complete volumes of work by a particular author without merit, or to describe a group of people usually found at poetry readings or shopping malls dressed in black Hot Topic clothes refering to themselves as "poets" or "artists," sometimes while quoting Marilyn Manson or Avril Lavigne.

examples:
1. "All the girls giggled, but it was clear his approach was merely wordinary."

2. "A wordinary volume, it serves itself best when gutted and used as an ashtray."

3. "All I wanted was a drink, but wordinaries were staging a reading at the pub."

midday child

2006-03-26T16:53:00.000-05:00

midday child

midday at the corner of my own space crumbling
with mouth streaming sweat of years gone by
and tears fell soft, smiles glossed

we were going to be a thousand things
we were living out a thousand dreams
through one way to live and one way to die
which way was it you went then?
i haven't seen it in so long
in so long
so so long
so long

i let it touch my face again
trickle down
it was nice my friend
someday we'll be young again
i guess it all comes back in the end

~jay and jesse morgans

lost at me

2006-03-26T16:46:00.000-05:00

lost at me

and i like the way it feels when you talk to me
i did too much cocaine
and now i'll never sleep
and if i wait the whole night
i still won't get it right
just please don't leave

i'd be like my father but there's no such thing
and i like the way you're looking
but you're glancing nervously
and if i wait the whole night
i still won't get it right
just please don't leave

and you feel like a breeze
at least you do to me
and ask me what i'd do you for
and i'll tell you "anything..."
and if i wait the whole night
i still won't get it right
i lost at me

i lost at me
i lost at me
i lost at me

~jay morgans

quotes

2006-03-26T05:18:00.000-05:00

at one point, themorgansproject.com featured a famous and not so famous collection of quotes. this post includes one version of that page.

"You don't go on 'probably' when love and guns are in hand."
~Charles Bukowski, Pulp

"Often the best parts of life were when you weren't doing anything at all, just mulling it over, chewing on it. I mean, say that you figure that everything is senseless, then it can't quite be senseless because you are aware that it's senseless and your awareness of senselessness almost gives it sense. You know what I mean? And optimistic pessimism."
~Charles Bukowski, Pulp

"Let me tell you a little secret... Never let a cat around acid."
~Toby Lyons, at an afterhours Nightbreed knowledge exchange

"I've come to believe that corruption comes from within."
~Saint Peter, over Captain Morgan and Black Haus rainbows at Martini's, downtown Wilkes-Barre

"I haven't failed. I've found 10,000 ways that won't work."
~Benjamin Franklin

"Work is the curse of the drinking class."
~Oscar Wylde

"...was that Music? Hmm..did the singer actually hit a note?"
~"RenaissanceWomin," regarding The Morgans Project's "ani difranco wants me"

"I am down on whores and I shant quit ripping them till I do get buckled."
~Jack the Ripper, in a letter to the Central News Agency.

"'Just because' itself is reason just enough."
~Pain

"This was a goddess who could not dance, would not dance, and hated everybody at the high school. She would like to claw away her face, she told us, so that people would stop seeing things in it that had nothing to do with what she was like inside. She was ready to die at any time, she said, because what men and boys thought about her and tried to do to her made her so ashamed. One of the first things she would do when she got to heaven, she said, was to ask somebody what was written on her face and why it had been put there."
~Kurt Vonnegut, Deadeye Dick

"But if in your fear you would seek only love's peace and love's pleasures, Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass out of love's threshing-floor, Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears."
~Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

"If the little pervert's pouring, I'm there."
~(Saint) Peter Oliver, on the use of wine in church.

"I would never ever do anything as vulgar as having fun."
~Steven Morrissey

"Jay Morgans? He's the devil."
~Dan Falkowski

"What I lack in talent I make up for by having no charisma whatsoever."
~Jay

"I'm still in love with every woman I've ever been in love with."
~Jack Nicholson

"To the as-yet-unborn, to all innocent wisps of undifferentiated nothingness: Watch out for life."
~Kurt Vonnegut, Dead Eye Dick

"I am the dumbest bitch to ever scratch an itch."
~Ed Carle

"That is my principal objection to life, I think: It is too easy, when alive, to make perfectly horrible mistakes."
~Kurt Vonnegut, Dead Eye Dick

"Why must you tempt me like a sluggish monkey? Why must you toy with me like some kind of . . . toy?"
~The tiger in a Frosted MiniWheats commercial

"Quit reading Oscar Wylde and start taking amphetamines."
~Tippy, sitting at the bar at Gonda's

"It's a great life if you don't weaken."
~Nan (Jay&Jesse's grandmother)

"Love, and do what you like."
~St. Augustine

"Be wary of alcohol. It can make you shoot at tax collectors and miss."
~Robert A. Heinlein

"Music is the only sensual gratification which mankind may indulge in to excess without injury to their moral or religious feelings."
~Joseph Addison (1672-1719)

"I think animal testing is a terrible idea; they get all nervous and give the wrong answers."
~A Bit of Fry and Laurie

"A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices."
~William James

"Gold makes an awkward nest."
~Karawynn Long

"Love is like friendship caught on fire."
~Bruce Lee

"Trying is the first step towards failure."
~Homer Simpson

"'Screw women, play guitar...' That's gonna be on my tombstone"
~Jason Page

"...then you're a spoonhead."
~Jay stealing one of Jesse's phrases to settle an argument at an early So What practice. (submitted by Hugh Brightside.)

"I will never smoke a cigarette."
~Daniel W. Falkowski

"My true purpose . . . made me so desperate that real anguish tore my voice. I suggested that my artistic and outdoors pursuits were healthy, whereas beating your children bloody was something you didn't want the neighbors to hear about."
~Chris Furman, The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys

"Drink until she's cute, but stop before the wedding."
~Unknown

"You pyromaniac... I want my bridges back."
~Eileen Brennan of Nimbus

"It doesn't take seven minutes to get a sixpack."
~Isaac "Ike" Sutton, on following Jesse into Boris's Bar in South WIlkes-Barre to see what the trauma was.

"We just wronged two rights."
~Tippy, after one of the violent outbreaks downtown.

"Why does he play here all the time? He sucks."
~some 15-yr old girl at the Cafe Metropolis, regarding Jay's dubious musical talents.

"The only thing wrong with yesterday is today."
Tony Wilson, helping Jay cope with a madass hangover somewhere just outside of Kentucky.

"It's too bad you can't dip it in ink and draw with it..."
~Fast Eddie, on a topic of questionable origin.

"i fell asleep last night after listening to thirtysome repetitions of "tonight"(?) and then proceed to have a vivid nightmare where i was being viciously attacked by rats the size of cocker spaniels i advise you to post a disclaimer"
~taken from an email to Jay from Amanda Somma

"Don't be kissin girls, you're gonna get impetego."
~Jesse

"Now, these old fucks can steal all they want, and they can go and pass laws saying you can't say what you want. You can't look at this, and you can't look at that... You can't smoke this, you can't snort that... Me, baby, I got statistics. I've got stats. These people have been to bed with their parents."
~Lou Reed, "Sex With Your Parents"

"You've got to be careful when you're talking to people who listen."
~Tony Wilson

"Uh, we uh, got a report of someone being assaulted upstairs..."
~A Wilkes-Barre Police officer responding to Fast Eddie playing a large, makeshift tin drum at 5:30 a.m. at the den of evil.

"Apparently I'M STILL DRUNK."
~Weekender Assistant Editor and Nightbreed cohort Mike Faillace, with a next-morning reference to the night before.

Have an interesting quote we could use here? Email Jay with it...

weekender cd review by michael faillace

2006-03-26T05:13:00.000-05:00

note: the following links and email addresses may be outdated

From The Weekender, 3/9/2000
Like it Loud - CD Spin
by Michael Faillace, Ass. Editor

The Morgans Project is a constantly evolving example of what happens when you give acoustic guitars to a pair of brothers raised on punk rock and old school hip hop.

The core of The Morgans Project - brothers Jesse and Jay Morgans - are long time staples of the local music community and have been known by a variety of collective names throughout the years. Names like Soughwuttt and Shedding Blue have carried the duo, despite the constantly revolving lineup of musicians flanking them.

The Morgans Project's acoustic series, which began as a one time event, has now become the sole focus of the group and is their most impressive work to date. Emotion laced and soulful lyrics bonded to creative acoustic styling fuel the tracks on the band's debut indie CD, Nothing Should Happen Ever.

While team Morgans has a variety of tapes recorded during their younger years under different names, this is the first mass produced collection available of the exclusive works of The Morgans Project. The eight song compilation predominantly features Jesse and Jay on acoustic guitar with a soulful Jay handling lead vocals and the refreshingly serene Jesse pulling backup duties.

Nothing Should Happen Ever kicks off with one of the more uptempo selections from the CD, Curb Bite. Named after the memorable scene from American History X (those of you who have seen the movie will remember this particularly disturbing scene), this version of Curb Bite was originally recorded live at The Cafe Metropolis. Using unexpected pace changes and a rolling chorus, this track is a prime example of the epic storylines (Jay) Morgans is able to compress into a three minute song.

The CD progresses into Buttercup-Tonight , the initial half being a soothing instrumental featuring Morgans Project collaborator Todd Kopec on violin. The guitar and violin chords mesh together into a beautiful harmony which eventually blends into the powerful verse of Tonight. Tonight climaxes after a brief silence with a very tense duel of sorts between vocals and violin that must be heard to be appreciated.

Wind Still Sails, an unconventional song that doesn't follow any type of standard structure, is a darker selection than most. An eerie whistling rings at key points throughout Wind Still Sails; through the mellow whisper, the song embraces in it's closing minute.

Soft and sweet vocalist Terez Plummer of Salmon Herb Recipe makes a special appearance on vocals on Four Days. Angelic and precise are Plummer's vocals throughout the track, sounding more like a softly strummed harp than a vocal presence. The song, which was written by Plummer, fits into the musical scope of the CD well considering the drastic change in style.

The tracks Lay Your Troubles Down On Me and In Your Rain follow and lead into the CD's bread and butter - the exceptionally well done Seven.

In my eyes, this song embodies everything The Morgans Project does well. The song title and lyrics reflect a peek into the mind of a person with multiple personalities. The track features seven different voice tracks laid over one another (one for each personality) which may sound confusing at first - but is done so well that the lyrics flow together effortlessly as one. Seven's insightful lyrics and radio worthy chorus set this track aside from the others on Nothing Should Happen Ever - which is no easy task.

The CD closes with Papa's Coming Home, an emotional saga about fathers and the strength children find in their mother. A rare and touching selection with an incredible lead riff, Papa's Coming Home is the perfect way to end the roller coaster ride of emotions and melodies Nothing Should Happen Ever takes you through. Nothing Should Happen Ever doubles as a multimedia disc when inserted into a computer, offering song lyrics, a complete library of the CD's songs in mp3 format as well as an mp3 player and other goodies. The CD is available for sale on-line at www.mp3.com/themorgansproject or direct through The Morgans Project by e-mailing Jay at jay@themorgansproject.com. Point your browser to www.themorgansproject.com for more information.

lazy art helm

2006-03-26T05:09:00.000-05:00

lazt art helm
jay morgans

Even through a good life, tinges of regression are merely human nature. As a young man I longed for the summers of my childhood, as a slightly older young man I sought only to return to my coming of age, and on and on. I look back now upon my time here on this side and regret nothing, but no era of my span has ever struck me quite as deeply as the one I recount to you now.

While the events leading me here to this quiet room in old age with a pen in my hand and a wistful breath upon my lips may seem fantastic, the truth at the core of it all is anything but. It simply was and is, as I---simply---was then and am now.

I have never been a superstitious creature, never paid mind to the supernatural or extraordinary, but I can not offer any real explanation for the man and the events that revolved around him save to say that it all happened and thus, through the merit of its own truth and existence, it is not an astounding tale I tell but one of the utmost simplicity.

I happened upon him, or he happened upon me, one winter evening by chance. Even at this, I still must wonder: And what exactly is chance?

Though my nature often prevents me from doing so, allow me to try to be as precise and to the point as I can manage. There are words between the words of even the greatest and most concise explanations and stories, and my preoccupations with detail and clarity has occasion to promt me to find and use them all. To convey as much as I can before I get back to my own personal business at hand, and to let you do the same, I will try to be as brief as possible.

I cannot begin at the beginning. My life before was a misty blue haze, riddled with misguided shame and confusion. While this may be an ordinary and healthy piece of a person's development, I found these feelings to linger with great strength in me. I hadn't yet arranged or overcome them, and they were threatening to arrange and overcome me.

Born ugly as sin, I had little choice but to take my place in a world centered on becoming, being, and surrounding oneself with beauty. The Dracula complex, the frantic hustle to the fountain of youth, the cinnamon brown skin and half shirts on the women, the same skin covering the alert and anxious muscles of the men; these things were beyond me, above me, and I gradually learned my life without them.

I mention it only because I have come to think that somehow my position may have had something to do with my growth into what I would soon become.

I will not presume to take credit---the truth of the matter is that I would've been born attractive if anyone had givem me the choice. And I won't pretend to be above their line of thinking, either. If anyone had stopped to notice, my envy would have been awkward and obvious.

The saving grace in it all is that these pieces of our flesh world do not endure. It sounds cliché to call it all shallow, but something cannot truly be cliché until it is widely adopted and accepted. As you can probably see for yourself, this hasn't happened just yet. Not for most at least.

Perhaps even worse than the ones who scurry like ants for base fulfillment are the ones who deliberately don't. Nature is nature, and pretense never saved anyone. It's important to be who you are, even if you're rotten to the core. Or ugly. Exaggerating depth only serves to chip even more of the soul away, and trust me, you'll need that soul someday.

A little higher on the scale are the spiritualists, those with an honest gravitation towards what they perceive as other-worldly ideals and aspirations. But that is exactly where they go wrong. There is only one world, one space, one time. It's all existing here and now.

There is no "other-worldly."

I cast no judgements. I know that I too traveled each of those circles, working myself to death on each constant turn. I could not play the game, true---I lacked the looks, physique, status, and social abilities required---but I am man enough to admit that my heart ached on and on with jealousy of those who could. There were times I tried to emulate the ones I saw, there were times I almost could.

It was during one of these times that I met Damon.

I sat at the end of the bar alone, as was my usual custom. I was paying more attention to the pint of lager in front of me than the bustle of people around me, pausing only to notice the ones who would briefly notice me before moving along. The establishment, called simply The Pub, was housed in one of the oldest buildings in town. It was this fact that drew me there time and time again, as the architecture was sublime and the delicate carved woodworkings sprinkled about the place were a treasure found every time you passed one. The clientele, however, was another story indeed.

For the most part all they really had in common with each other was money, which set me apart immediately. Since this obvious schism somehow instinctively prompted them to, for the most part, ignore me without confrontation, I in turn offered them the same honor. Thus, it was quite a shock in my intoxication when the seat next to mine was suddenly occupied by an olive-skinned man in an expensive and finely tailored suit. Even more odd, he was facing me in a way that said he was waiting for me to speak.

"A drink for my friend," I said to the woman behind the bar, loudly enough that she would hear over the dim roar of the animated conversations around us.

"Another triple?" she asked him, eyeing his glass. He nodded, and I winced as she reached to the absolute top shelf behind her for his scotch. So much for arrogance.

He downed the scotch in a fierce gulp and slammed the glass back down, smiling. I raised an eyebrow, but offered no further reaction. He looked disappointed briefly, and he leaned forward. "All right, listen," he said. "I'm going to tell you a secret."
Making a snap reading on the situation, I replied, "I'm not gay."
He laughed again, a surprisingly good-natured bellow that was actually shocking. "No, no, nothing like that. Something else."
"If you want entertainment, buy a dancing monkey," not eager to be anyone's distraction. "You can obviously afford one," I said lower. My answer seemed to satisfy him somehow, and he nodded solemnly.
"I understand," he muttered, twice. He stared into his empty glass for a few long minutes, shaking the ice lightly, and I turned away. "Wait," he suddenly snapped, before I could get back to my drink. "Come with me."

We walked through a curtained doorway just beyond the bar. He somehow had another glass of scotch in his hand, and for the first time that night it occurred to me how drunk I must have been. He removed what looked to be a small vial from his pocket and dumped its silverish, powdered contents into his glass. "You envy me," he said.
In truth, now with some miles to look back over, I'm sure I did, though I denied it to him then with an incredulous expression. "I feel I must tell you my secret," he explained, disregaurding my implication that I needed nothing. "Would you like to know?"
Acting nonchalant, I nodded my head in as disinterested a way as I could, going even so far as to look impatient to get back to my stool. His voice came slow and golden as he whispered, "I am always at the helm. That is the secret."

Seeing that I didn't understand, he handed me his glass. "I can't tell you any more until you drink." I remember being hesitant but curious, and---as was often the case in those hours---the alcohol turned out to be the deciding factor. Sober I would never take such a blatantly drugged drink from an absolute stranger, but in the post-midnight haze of the drunken evening, I did.

He watched with satisfaction as I drained the contents. The scotch was strangely sweet and passed my lips easily. Seeing that I managed to get it all down, he continued. "Everyone has a helm, do you understand?" I shook my head. He raised his finger to his lips, signaling my silence. "Just wait."

I began to feel lighter. I felt my body rock back into the wall. "This is it," I thought, "I've finally done myself in. If I wake up ever it will be in such a state that I'm sure I'll wish I stayed unconscious." I noticed him noticing my disarray, but he just stood and waited.

Suddenly, much quicker than it came on, the feeling vanished. I wasn't even sure if I was still drunk or not. The lights seemed sharper though, and I felt as if I could pick out each word from the many blended conversations in the next room.
"Everyone has a helm," he said again with a slow urgency that chilled me. He paused this time, looking very heavily into my face. "Do you understand?"

Somewhere beyond my vision, or maybe inside it, I could see the millions of fragments that made up my soul, my memory, my passions and my pains. I saw them as red static, I saw them as sparks of light and color, I saw them as furtive glances. I saw them as mountains so gold they could blind God himself.

And I nodded my head.

"Desire is a slick and dirty animal," he said as we reclaimed our seats in the dark corner we had come from. There were more people in the room than before, but somehow it wasn't so loud, somehow it didn't feel crowded. I realized that I was no longer being jostled back and forth by people clawing their way to the bar. I realized that I felt taller.

"The problem with that," he continued, "is that it's also self-contained. It is born inside you, it lives inside you, it feeds of its own devices inside you. And if you're anything less than careful, it will die inside you."

"What could this have to do with me?" I asked, when I meant to ask "What exactly was in that drink?"

"I see your pride," he said. "I also see your shame. You can see now how close to each other they really are, yes?"
I couldn't deny it. Without ever so much as rubbing against each other, the feelings existed in me as one. When I walked through that room of the rich and distant, I was proud of my beaten boots, proud of my sore hands and back. I also hated myself knowing that they had attained with no effort what I was really striving for with my overtime and defeated lust. I was suddenly surrounded by the sparks again. I had to close my eyes, but the lights would not leave me. I heard my own voice speaking in some mathematical language, hard sounds with no curves. Logic told me that I didn't know the words, but the message I understood: The pride in the effort creates the shame of the outcome.

As the message came in with such clarity, the colors and lights fuzzed back into blurry shadows. Most floated around my head and chest before finally assimilating themselves back into my body. The rest stayed somewhat brighter and floated like helicopter oak tree seeds around the room. I had been visited by my own common sense, and I was amazed.

"It works that way with everything when you ride the helm," he said of the realizations casting their glows across my face.
"I was made to be the messenger, that is my place and I accept it as such. In the acceptance I can perform to the limits of my destiny, and in turn collect the gifts my truth in purpose creates without guilt. Everyone has this helm inside them, everyone is a compass. Few ever notice let alone realize. I knew when I saw you that you needed to see, that you were failing the grand scheme of things." He winked with his last four words, and I felt I should be offended at his suggestion. I withdrew into my thoughts far enough to let the angry feeling hit me, but it never came. I agreed with him, and I was grateful. It wasn't so much his words that made sense, but the unity of the sentences.

Not just his---all the sentences.

"What am I then?" I asked. I could think of a few things right about me. I worked hard, tried to be gentle and good to the world around me, I was open and honest. I seldom lied and even more seldom hurt anyone. A healer perhaps, I thought. Or maybe a messenger, as was my newfound friend.

"I couldn't tell you," he sighed. "For all the insight you must at this moment be thinking I have, I'm just another servant." As pretentious as the words themselves were, I knew to believe him. I realized with a speeding certainty what I already knew: I would find my place. All I really had to do was not look.

I closed my eyes and saw light, real light. When I opened them again, the seat next to me was empty. Thinking for a moment that it had all been a sick, sleep-deprived halucination, I saw the back of his meticulously groomed head as he made his way towards the door.

Sparks flew crackling with electricity from my chest and head, spanning the room in two directions before meeting at a single point just in front of him. He turned, and what I saw in his face was horrifying, more shocking than any event of that night or any other before or since. I saw his sadness.

"You won't need me," he revealed, and I could tell that this was true. I could also see very clearly that he wished it weren't so, that this was a moment he lived over and over, despite his fine Spanish looks and obvious wealth. "But my name is Damon, and this night has been my privilege."

He disappeared behind a muscular man with a boyish face who was feeling up the ass of the drunken girl in his bulky arms. She was giggling quietly, but I heard her over everything else. Considering the surroundings and circumstance, she sounded to me like a baby. No, that isn't right. She sounded to me the way strawberries feel going down your throat. Yes, that's more correct.

Forgetting myself and the compassion I had felt for Damon's plight, I leaned forward, almost pressing my face to the large man's forehead. He jerked back quickly in reflex, allowing me to lean further, to lay my partially open lips up on the forehead of the woman still in his arms.

The room dissolved into its own background, the only real things left were the woman---whose eyes had gone soft, alert, and slightly glossy---and myself.

Slowly the room and din of talk returned, and it was as if the moment had never happened. Every piece of my body and mind understood that to the bar and the people in it, the moment never had happened. It was not, as language would try to force us say, "other-worldly," but its existence on our plane was entirely dependant on the existence of me, of her, and of that laugh that spoke more truth than this side could ever hold. Worlds within worlds, and they're all the same world. I caught her eyes one last time, and I could see that for the moment she understood it as well. It was then that I realized what I was stumbling through was no drunken blur. It was very real.

Reeling with questions and answers, I suddenly remembered Damon. I stood on the tips of my toes and surveyed the crowd, but he was gone.

More than gone, he had vanished.

I awoke with the sun in my eyes. I didn't, and still don't, remember leaving The Pub or arriving home. I made coffee, found half of the bagel from the morning before still on the table. I took a bite and threw it away. I sipped the coffee and lit a cigarette. I could not shake that last look on Damon's face. No, I can't say it was a look on his face. It was bigger than that.

For someone who was so drunk that he forgot going home, I felt incredibly relaxed and well. The toxic after effects of so much alcohol had somehow skipped me that time. My senses still felt electric, direct and clear. I walked slowly to my bedroom, taking in my apartment with a sharpness I never had before. There were all my familiar belongings, and yet I felt closer to them, as if I knew them better. I had somehow made friends with my environment.

I searched and searched for a word to describe what I was seeing, a blanket that could cover the scope of all the new angles I was observing from. With great and absolute force a word broke through my teeth, and off every molecule of empty air around me I heard my own voice resound, "Potential."

I ran though the kitchen to the pantry and collected two almost empty gallon cans of house paint. Tripping over myself, I rushed with them back to the bedroom. I tore the top sheet from the bed and laid it flat on the floor.

Eight hours later, as the tired sun drooped down over the mountains bordering the town, I finished my very first painting. I sat against the wall for what seemed like hours, wondering how this dream filtered out through my fingers. It was a six-foot tall portrait of Damon's face, and somehow memory and house paint had mingled into his exact expression as he turned to me that last time.

I can't say that I painted with passion or purpose. It was a liquid act to me, and didn't actually engulf me in until the work was done.

It was that moment, in the fading light though my cracked window, that I knew the directions of my helm. And in love and honor, I gave it title: "The Lazy Art Helm."

I won't blur the issues with the story of my quick entrance and rise through the art scene. Let's just say this; after that first painting I quit my job, and never again had a need to return. I'll admit it involves chance and oddity beyond explanation and leave it at that.

It was neither a coincidence nor a surprise when walking into The Pub became a different experience entirely. Those same bland and chubby faces now rallied around me, and, with my newfound and delightful clarity, I forgave them all, even going as far as to feel a little of their shame for them. It was also no surprise when they all flocked to my first show. They could smell my status without even catching a glimpse of how little it meant to me. Or how little it really meant to them.

The gallery that hosted that first show was the largest and most elegant in the state, The Operant. I was standing in its grand foyer when in the corner of my eye I spotted the sparks. Recognizing them for what they were, yet knowing they were not mine, I followed them around the corner into the main viewing room with some sort of blind urgency.

The thickly lit trail led further and further into the room, rising in magnitude as I neared the source. I was so enthralled with this pursuit and the dazzling sense of the lights themselves that, upon reaching their end, I knocked her over. The lights flashed a shocked, deep red and darted back around and into her, closing up like a tightly woven mesh encompassing most of her upper body. They swarmed there for a moment, then softened in their color and calmed in their motions, caressing the air around them in a light whisper as a champagne bubble does fine crystal.

Regaining myself, I helped her to her feet. She seemed only slightly annoyed, and I apologized as I helped her to right herself on her high heels. "No, no, it's all right," she said, brushing me away. "I'm fine, it's all right."

She was plain in stature and shined with some kind of purity that I almost found disturbing, considering my environment and the events unfolding around us. I almost didn't notice the dark gray tracks of mascara left down her cheeks by very recent tears.

"It looks like nothing's really working out for you tonight," I said, explaining my observation by wiping one side of her cheek with the bottom of my thumb, letting the rest of my fingers trail for one blue moment on the back of her neck.

She laughed suddenly in embarrassment, drying her eyes with her index fingers. "Oh, oh," she repeated again and again, buying time to get the real words. "I usually don't make such a spectacle of myself," she finally stammered, giving up on explanation. "It's just that…" Her words trailed of in self-preservation.

I took her hand in mine and felt its perfection on my skin, up my arm and into my shoulders, until finally it pounded deep inside my chest and resonated there with a power I had never known before.

The sudden intimacy startled her, and her arm twitched back towards her body, but she held my hand just the same. "Pardon me," she said, no longer so shocked and spinning a mock, haughty English accent into her voice. "But you seem to be holding my hand."

I looked down as if I didn't even know I had a hand. "Why yes, you're absolutely right," I said.

"And the reason for that would be what?"

"You don't know?" I asked, and she shook her head, enjoying the playfulness of our sudden and unconventional meeting.

"Yes, yes you do know," I said, realizing that my voice had acquired the same calm assurance that Damon's had when he spoke to me. Her playful expression dropped into one of real concern and bewilderment. "Perhaps you don't understand, but I believe very firmly that you know."

Lowering my head so that my lips just barely brushed the top of her ear as I spoke, I whispered the words I was hearing in my head when I was first drawn to take her smooth long fingers in mine in the first place. "I don't have any choice," I said. I backed up slightly, just enough to bring my hand up between her face and mine. I traced her lips with a fingertip for a moment. "You see, no matter how long I live, no matter how withered or useless this hand becomes, I will always and with great reverence look down upon it and know that it is good. I will know it is good because it once held yours, even just for a minute."

Her eyes were tearing up again. "You're the painter, aren't you?" she said. I had assumed she knew that much.

"What do you mean?" I asked her, thinking there must be more to the question.

"You're the one," she said. "You're the one who painted that." She pointed to the small painting on the wall beside us, the one she had been looking at when I crashed into her just moments earlier. Looking at it again, with her next to me, I saw what she meant. The face was generic and nowhere near exact, but the face was undeniably hers. She had begun crying when she read the title of the tiny piece on the index card below it. For no reason I could fathom then or now, I had called it "Marie."

I left my own debut show just after meeting Marie in front of the painting I had inadvertently tossed into the smooth and huge gears of fate and time. We walked through the city for hours, this same city that weeks before had fooled me into thinking I was beaten, defeated, stuck. It's tricks were no good anymore, I would never believe the whispers of those devious and taunting streets again.

I continued to paint, making more of a living than the factory would ever offer, and Marie and I married shortly after in a simple ceremony at the courthouse downtown. I had thrown all the pieces of a puzzle into the air, or had all the pieces thrown at me, and they landed in flawless alignment.

I thought of Damon often, in thanks and in sadness at his absence. I wished there were some way I could let him know how it all worked out, that his work was important even if his part in it was short-lived, even if he his gift dictated that he lose what he seemed to desire most. The enlightenment he gave me had changed every single angle of my life… And I would not forget him for it.

They say that the best revenge is living well, and that might be true, but sometimes living well can be your only way of repaying that kind of debt. And that's exactly what I did.

Marie and I settled into life with each other, trusting our choices while still learning the shapes and curves of living and loving with each other. We found our lives to fit as perfectly as our hands did that first night, and we fell further and further into each other as each day passed into night, as each night passed into day.

I remembered a time when I found it foreign to have visions---how I first found the way my impulses turned into actions unsettling---but soon I couldn't fathom life without this plane, this ultra-dimensional frame of view.

I was inside the pulse of destiny. Painting was my haphazard vessel, languid and easy were my motions on the canvas. And I, me, the no one sitting alone at the end of the bar; I was at the lazy art helm.

Nothing of such impact as my new life could come without a flip side, as I would soon learn. Making love to Marie was still an act of the most divine religion, but the signs were fading. No longer did I see the sparks of her burn into the sparks of me, no longer was our union so obvious. I knew somewhere in the back of my mind that I had come to take such obvious signs for granted, that I had come to rely on them for the trust, certainty, and belief I held so dear. I wondered if their gradual absence was to build my faith, to keep all aspects of my being up to the speed of the level I had come to exist on. But, with no tangible resources with which to answer even that question, my doubts simmered at the bottom of me, growing and gaining momentum.

Marie noticed the change in me, and was frightened at the cracks in my confidence. I woke her early one morning after an unfortunate encounter with two bottles of wine. "Tell me!" I shouted above her, shaking her by the shoulders. I gave her a few moments to rub the misty sleep from her eyes before shaking her again. "How did you know?"

Forever understanding of my wildly pendulum-like temperament, she calmly sat up under me, resting her goddess head against the wall. "How did I know what, dear?" she asked, stroking my face as a mother would an infant.

"That night," I explained, softening my voice enough to dull the threat in my tone. "How did you know when we met that it would be all right, how did you know then that we could get even this far?"

"I didn't," she said, as if it was nothing in the world.

"No, no, no, no," I cried, springing up from the bed. "You know I know more than that! I knew your fears, but I knew your certainty as well. How do you do that?" I had explained my peculiar modes of thinking and reason to Marie once before, and while she listened patiently I could tell she believed it to be more delusion than divine intervention. She dismissed it as just one of the eccentricities alloted to artists and gave it no more thought.

"You're right," she admitted. "But when I stopped long enough to recognize you, I realized you were with me all along. I knew I knew you from somewhere inside of me that was untouched. And when I saw myself through your eyes I felt for the first time ever that I was beautiful, in only the truest kinds of ways."

How she could speak like me in my brightest of moments without the cheating benefits of the sights and senses I had come to rely so heavily upon was beyond me. It ate away at me as I paced back and forth at the foot of the bed, casting quick and burning glares in her direction.

She rolled onto her knees and reached across to me. I stopped walking at her touch. I stopped breathing at her touch. It was true that I couldn't see or feel anything symbolic in the exchange, but I felt a reserve burst inside of me. Something explosive had given way. She laughed softly at me, pulling me onto the bed and rolling until I was on top of her. "You," she whispered. "How you can know so certainly that belief is something we only find in ourselves and still be so afraid if you can't see it?"

I knew she was right, and my fear eased. We made love slowly and with absolute and great purpose. Afterwards she slept, and for the first time in weeks I painted. It was another picture of Damon. In this one, he was waving backwards to me, riding the back of a bird into the forever that starts just at any horizon.

I woke Marie again a few nights later, this time gently and with many apologies. I held her face in my hands as she woke, and I wept. She held me softly, and I appreciated her tolerance. My love for her was true enough that I knew I must offer her a way out.

My dance with unsubstantiated trust was brilliant but short-lived. The faith I had borrowed from her in the shining hours just before morning had faded into fear with no warning or mercy. I had attempted to work the paint, but my deliberate and obvious attempts disgusted me. It was time to accept that my run had ended. It was a good run, yes, and I enjoyed the rewards. And now it was time.

"Marie," I told her, refusing to let the choke of tears affect my voice, "I am no longer the man you met, I am no longer the man you fell in love with, I am no longer the man you married." She looked back at me patiently. "I will carry the ache of you leaving for the rest of my life, through anything I do from now until then, but I think it's best if you do."

She was smiling. "You're so crazy," she said, shaking her head. "Do you know what you get if you start a sword fight with destiny?"

I cocked my head to the side. "What do you get?"

"A sword in your belly."

She wrapped her arms---her sister arms, her protection arms, her poet arms---around me and held me to her chest. "Sleep, love," she said. "Sleep."

And, in absolute peace, that's exactly what I did.

The years have gone by me. As I write an ending to what is somewhat a life story, somewhat an explanation, and somewhat a plea, Marie sits across the room drawing. As it would happen, she is quite the artist herself, and losing my own abilities lured this talent out of her.

I am letting my eyes drift back and forth from this page and back to her, and I can't help thinking as I enjoy the sight of both that this hand---my hand---has lived up to the promise I made to her so long ago. It is a good hand, and has done well by me, and I thank it every time I think to for taking hers amidst that rushed and heated moment in the sterile halls of that dreadful gallery.

I had no choice but to accept the way I was thrown so harshly back into my old self. Eventually, I reached a new zone of my own understanding, one in which I could appreciate the experience without the bitterness of loss ruining my perceptions.

I no longer know the good or evil orientations or intentions of people just by looking at them, just by passing them on the street. I can no longer taste flavors in sounds, or see the colors of feeling. Those things left me that night as I slept so near to her womb, so near to the center of her and myself and the universe that even I of such doubt could not deny its allure.

But there was a time when I was blessed, when I got to play the prince of every fairy tale in the human imagination, and it was a beautiful and learning time in my world. My world that revolves in this world, which in whole exists in and along side another world, and on and on.

I would like to say that I reached this easy and medium plateau entirely by my own device, but that just wouldn't be true. Once again, my life turned a hard and sudden corner, my dear friend Damon pointing the way.

It was Autumn and a day worthy of a walk. I walked the few blocks to the river and followed the path along it, wanting to get out of the asphalt and brick for a while. My thoughts were on contentment as I started at the sight just up the the trail a few yards.

Without seeing his face, I recognized him by his suit, the same one I had seen him in the night we met. I rolled him over by his shoulder and gasped as his hand shot up to grip me. His hands, his face, his neck; covered in his own blood.
"Damon!" I cried, trying to help him up. He brushed me away, shaking his head.

"You don't understand," he said, gurgling soft bubbly spurts of blood as he spoke. "I'm finally done. I've reached the height of my purpose here. This is a joyous moment."

"No, Damon, you can't, not now… I've lost everything you ever gave me, I've lost everything I had. I won't lose you, not now and not like this." I began to tear at his shirt to find the wound. I found the wide puncture and pressed a strip of the cloth hard against it. It looked as if the knife had been twisted before being withdrawn.

"Lost?" he asked, seemingly unaware that his own life spilling out at our feet. "Because you can't paint? Because they say you've burnt out?" He was, as I could expect, right.

"And the vision, I've lost that too," I tried to explain, this time almost forgetting his situation myself. I held his body in my hands, I could feel his muscles giving up as his head rolled pointlessly on his neck.

"This," he said, holding the wound in his side, "is just a part of the purpose. The man who did this had to for the purpose. And I, I am no longer for this side of our lives. So I'm going away. Your vision, it had no more purpose here, and now it's gone away."

I tried feverishly to understand, knowing that with my former perception I could grasp it. He saw my confusion and disappointment and raised his hand to my face, gingerly feeling my cheek with his palm. "Don't worry," he said. "Don't be afraid. You're still fighting the good fight, you're still at the lazy art helm. Even if you never touch paint again. That was a step, not a destination."

I was stunned to hear those words, words I myself had never even spoken aloud---the lazy art helm.

He died in my arms, spending his last minute on saving me yet again. I was certain that had I still been able to see those drifting sparks, his would have been skyrocketing upwards, sure of their target and divine in their light.

That night, I sat in the open window of our third-floor apartment, smoking a cigarette and ashing into the air, watching the embers gray out and drift lightly to the ground.

"You seem happier," Marie said from behind me. "Did you paint today?"

I tossed the cigarette and walked across the room to her silhouette in the doorway. "I don't think I'll ever paint again," I said. "Unless I really need to."

She looked concerned and hurriedly made he way towards me, putting one arm around my neck. "Never paint? I know you haven't scored so well with the..."

I stopped her with a motion of my hand. I smiled the smile of the prophets, of the explorers, of the angels.

"I know now what I really have to do," I said. "I have to write it all down."

Forever tolerant, she smiled and kissed my forehead. "I'll make something to drink."

I turned once again out the window and lit another cigarette, this time letting my eyes follow the smoke upward as it gently dissipated in the same slow manner as my thoughts. In the middle of the quiet sky was the huge and heavy moon, and in its crevices and shadows were distinct lines that swirled into colors and contours that settled into edges that made up the smiling face of Damon, pure and good and finally home.
"I'm going to do it, Damon," I called up to the moon. "I'm going to write it. I'll let them all know." I said it half to assure him that his work was done and done well and half because even in my certainty I sought his respect and approval.

The face winked down upon me once and disappeared.

windows & webs: how jay morgans single-handedly launched the internet web cam phenomenon

2006-03-26T04:57:00.000-05:00

note: some links may be outdated.

Windows & Webs:
The New Voyeurs
By Jay Morgans

(This article originally appeared in The Weekender, 12/3/98)

Most states have pretty strict laws against pressing your face up against someone's window and watching them go about their daily business, which is a damn shame when there's nothing to do on a Tuesday night. So what's a curious little monkey to do? Well, turn on the computer, of course...

As the Internet grows to create its own unique sets of needs, it also finds itself in the middle of some interesting and often controversial developments; one of which is the birth and implementation of the webcam.

Just as the name implies, a webcam is a digital camera set up so that its output can be viewed directly on the World Wide Web in just about any web browser, anywhere in the world. The technology is boiling over with uses---from the practical (such as videophones) and the pornographic (use your imagination) to perhaps most intriguing and potential use of all; the artistic. And who better to lead the way in the artistic exploration of the webcam than born artist Ana Voog?

A self-made singer / songwriter / performance artist / visual artist who also enjoys writing, painting, drawing, and sewing, Ana and her Anacam moved into the webcam scene and quickly became something of a standard by which others can be judged.

"It is a window into my house, into my life," she explains. And what might that consist of? "A picture updated every few minutes showing what I'm doing right now. Sometimes I might be just staring (I'm really good at that), sometimes I'll be surfing the net, sometimes I'll be dancing wildly about my house to some disco music, sometimes I might be eating cereal, sometimes I might be taking a bubblebath, sometimes I might be writing songs or singing or painting, sometimes I might be reading, sometimes I might put on little skits or decide to cover myself in blue paint or something weird. Because I'm a weird girl. So be prepared for weird and strange things to happen all of a sudden out of nowhere. But also be prepared to just watch me sleep, too. I like to sleep."

An obvious question is "Why would anyone want to watch someone else sleep?" I guess the answer to that depends entirely on your frame of mind, but the obvious question that follows that one would have to be: "Why would anyone do it?"

"The reason I started it is because it is the perfect medium for me since I can create spontaneously with a worldwide audience from the comfort of my own home!" she divulged in our recent interview; conducted, appropriately enough, via email. "I love to communicate... But yet i like to do it from a distance."

Or a more detailed reason, as she writes in her own FAQ at www.anacam.com: "Well, to tell you the truth I don't totally know why. I'm just really curious, I guess to do this as some sort of experiment. I'm very interested in the study of human nature, so this is kind of a study in that, sort of. I guess I just want to see what kind of effect it will have on me and what will happen. Plus, I feel I have a lot of fun things to share, and since I'm an entertainer by nature and profession, it just seemed cool to be able to do it on the net, it's such an immediate medium. I want to keep expanding myself in [the] different ways I can communicate to people. I'm an artist through and through. And this is a terribly arty, self-indulgent thing to do, so I just had to do it. It was such an intense idea. And i like intense, and I like to push boundaries of what people think a woman is and isn't. Because i am in 'showbiz,' people always want to know about me, and they usually get it all wrong and try to put me into a neat little compartmentalized package for mass consumption. It's like having a speculum up your ass and that's all they can see. So I'm also doing this to say "Here ya go, here's my life, I'm a real person and here I am in all my mundane and spectacular glory.

"But mostly, all analyzing aside, I'm just doing this for the pure surreal fun of it. No lie. It's just plain simple fun. I think I'm more amused by this project than anyone! I just think this is a fabulous opportunity to share my life through my cam, my art, my analogs (diary and updates) and my writings (anagrams), and in that process, learn more about everything!"
And there can be no argument that the Internet has certainly brought an entire new level of knowledge and accessibility to the world. "It has allowed me to communicate instantaneously and hone my communication skills," Ms. Voog admits. "The net allows me to meet people I would have never met otherwise. I think it's a fantastic opportunity to let the world get to know each other and learn how interconnected we all are!" And apparently it's working out just fine. Aside from meeting her boyfriend through the twisting phone lines and networks, Voog's latest album, www.anavoog.com (named after the website her label had made for her), debuted on the Internet. The album marks a decided switch to electronica from her last band, The Blue Up?, whose last album was released on Columbia Records. Her webcam site has links that can take you to information about her music career, including photos and webcam captures of her live shows. Not since Andy Warhol and The Velvet Underground toured as The Exploding Plastic Inevitable has art been so intrinsically linked to live music. Her shows consist of, as she put it, "me, my music, and fetik3 playing keyboards... A few mannequins, candy necklaces, bubble machine and invisible surprises!"

Ana, who says she is an introvert ("...although if you saw me in public you'd swear I was an extrovert," she continues), adapted rather easily to having her life put on display worldwide, pretty much every second of every day---even taking her cam on road trips and tours. "I was like a fish to water," she says. "[And] what i do is me. It's my life. It's not a show or an act."
Seemingly skipping the pressure that might arise from having such a large and devoted following, Ana plans to continue on into the future the same way she's gotten this far. "My current projects are just to continue expanding with my cam, paint a lot more this winter, write some new songs and get back to writing in my journal everyday. Those are the main ones. Then I have 77 other ones."

Downsides of being an Internet personality? Ana Voog says simply, "My mother hates my cam."

Perhaps the greatest adverse opinions on webcams would be related to the slap-in-the-face kind of pornography they're often associated with. While it is true that with just a little bit of searching and a credit card you can find just about anyone doing anything to anyone else or themselves, Ana has proved with her artistry that this need not always be the case. But on the risque side of the new webcam culture is Isabella@Home (http://www.isabellacam.com), a site now teamed up with Anacam. There's a delicate and blurry line between trashy smut and erotic art, mostly defined by the observer, but Isabella is one woman who has found a way to utilize the new medium with a graceful sensuality. "Ana's [is] a 24/7 cam where her whole life is exposed, and mine is a nightly show that is well prepared and heavy in content of an erotic nature," Isa explains of the differences (and accentuations) of the two sites. "An interesting angle with us is also that although we have never met, we have become good friends and each
other's cam is our respective favorite. We both love what the other is doing with the opposite approach."

Isabella has taken erotic web art to an entire new level of insight and preparation, often hailed for her painstaking measures in lighting, production, and content. "There are hundreds of homecams out there now, but there are very few
that are doing anything interesting," she says of the sites that are giving the genre a bad name. "Most are simply 'peek-a-boo' shows without a lot of thought or production value put into them."

There's little chance that Isa's site could ever be loosely lumped into that category. The time and energy she devotes to her art (she's been on cam five nights a week since October of 1997) is evident, as much about self-exploration as it is exhibitionism. "Isabella@Home is an erotic work-in-progress that I have been doing now for one year," she explains on her site."It is an ongoing experience that is designed to make you think and excite you on every level. I have created a site where people who are exploring alternative avenues for erotic content come to not only experience, but perhaps even contribute to the process through forums and submitted artwork, etc... The webcam is a major way I express myself but only a single dimension for the site itself. Let me assure that this isn't about making money showing my body to strangers, it is about creating live, truly interactive and progressive erotic art... Isabella@Home [is] an oasis on the net where people who think alike can always come for some new headcandy and psychoeroticism to boot... In other words, if you're looking for something wild and a little different... you found it."

It can't be disputed that Isa is at the absolute head of her own slow, stylish sense of erotica on the net. Her site features discussion forums, member-submitted artwork and writing, an online journal, and graphics of the prints (for sale through the site) captured from the webcam during her shows. Perhaps the best way to describe her tangled web of art, sensuality, and Internet technology is to resort to her own words, found in a journal entry from January 3, 1998:

"sitting in a smokey ring on my floor...black
lacy stockings...my favorite black silky,
stretchy slip...the one i love 2 sleep
in...sitting...laying...stretching....reaching
toward the ring...looking up into the cam
above me...into your eyes...into my
eyes...stretching out...slip off...stockings
on...a closer view....as my fingers roam... smokey ring from brown 2 maroon 2 a lighter
red...embracing me...warm...and
comfortable...lacy stockings like spider
webs... i am in the web..."

A Brief Un-Comprehensive List of Webcams:
(warning: these links lead to material that is very not suitable for children)

Anacam: http://www.anacam.com - the home of Ana Voog

Isabella@Home: http://www.isabellacam.com - spider-spun writing, art, and live shows, all revolving around Isa's intriguing blend of erotica, sensuality, and flawless production

AmberCam: http://www.cybersexvr.com/webcam.htm - definately adults only

QuestionVision: http://www.questionvision.com - QuestionVision is the online community of QuestionGirl... as the enterance to the site says, "If this site were a film, it might be rated PG-13. If this site were a television show, it might be rated MA. There may be content here only suitable for adults."

World of Aja: http://www.ajaworld.com - another hugely popular place among webcam afficiandos, Aja's racy attitude and cam presence draws quite a bit of attention

JujuCam: http://www.jujucam.com - husband and wife Kaos and Juju display her exhibitionist tendencies

The Land of Venus: http://www.landofvenus.com - this Las Vegas dancer and bodybuilder was one of the first adult cams around

Jennifer Live: http://www.planetcam.com/jennifercam/ - an adults only site featuring Jennifer; who is, as the site boasts, "the kind of woman you've always dreamed would open a cam-site."

JenniCam: http://www.jennicam.org/ - this freelance web designer was one of the pioneers of the webcam

The Enchantress Cam: http://www.enchantresscam.com/ - cam site with a sultry medevial theme

pennsylvania

2006-03-26T04:51:00.000-05:00

pennsylvania

autumn does everything but fall
this far up into pennsylvania
i drive up into the mountains that have
cradled me here
a wilkes-barre Almustafa
with more balls than insight
and no ship on the horizon.

i park off the road and look out
fireflies buzzing far off
fireflies waiting
blinking here and there
i smile at them

pennsylvania, i hear whispers
i know your pittsburgh
i know its college scene
and its pill district
i know its summers in sewickley
where the rich folk ran our dirty asses out
i know its starlight there
no light pollution at all
and i remember when i finally realized
that the rich even own the sky

and your west philly
with the younger ones throwing toughass glares
to the one jackass skinny white kid
walking down the street
trying to find a bar that won't throw him out
for his pale nervous stare
or pale nervous skin
then finally the old men and women
down on lancaster ave.
running errands for the bartender for
a glass of wine or a cheese sandwich
the toothless smiles
and dirty homeless dreams
finally young again for a second
billy holiday and ray charles on
the jukebox
and no one's ever even heard of
puff daddy.

and from here on this mountain
giant's despair
i can still see my old girlfriend
laying on the rock below me
looking up at me or maybe
just the sky
and i can remember the only time
wilkes-barre has ever been beautiful---
on the highway at night
the first glimpse of the smalltown city lights
glimmer and laugh
as we get back into town.

but enough about all that,
the fireflies are falling out
and i need something like sleep
pennsylvania,
i am yours
please do not forget me.

~jay morgans

when i had first written "pennsylvania," i emailed it to the world famous hugh o'connell, and this was his reply:

Subj: Re: 10
Date: 11/17/98 2:03:06 AM Eastern Standard Time
From: ******
To: jay morgans

that was absolutely beautiful skin. you were perfectly able to do what i've been trying to do forever now - trying to seemingly have a definate beginning middle and end, without actually having them - dick. j/k.
i hate to be a pretencious artfag poet and send a poem in place of poem, but what can i say, i'm lame.

- not interested. -

These, things,
turn, turn, and roll over
and flounder themselves
a million different ways from
right.
and from true.
The sun sticks
long
on the bricks, but can't
compete with the grey
too tired, been up too long,
can't find work, and
smoked my last cigarette
mornings.
The paper reads like the
recycled version of last week's news
that it's made from,
and all the money in the world
circulates, but never to me.
So I just sit here and
read, read, read.
Sylvia's butcher is looking
for a pardon, because he
knows his life is up before paperback.
Can you blame him?
he knew more about nature and animals
than real life,
poor sod.
So it's back to the grey
and the mindless mosaic of
brick,
where the sun just don't stick.
I think it's going to be
a long day.

and that, obviously, is one of many reasons i love hugh so much.

an old writing excercise from quill.net: a "meeting of rivals theme"

2006-03-26T04:48:00.000-05:00

Scenes
~ January's Winner ~
Jay Morgans
The Situation: The meeting of rivals

He heard a deep voice behind him; unnaturally deep. Eerie. "Marcus...," the voice said. He knew the tone well.

Marcus turned to see a burly figure emerging from the cornered shadows of the alleyway. He leaned his lithe frame against the brick building and lit a cigarette. He tried to lower his voice to match the first, but it was such a stretch it sounded something like what would be comical if the etched and sunken face wasn't the vessel of it. "Richard, I was beginning to think you'd skipped out on me." He let slip half of a smile and pulled a hit from the cigarette, letting the smoke case out slowly and circle his head.

"You know that wouldn't happen. Let's walk."

The pair exited the alley and cut down the sidewalk. It was late--the autumn night whispering of winter--but the streets were filled. They were always filled. The hookers and pimps, the pushers and junkies, they never got a night off. You had to respect that kind of vigilance.

"Those cigarettes, they're going to kill you," Richard said.

"I wouldn't do you the favor," came the answer, and Richard's face winced.

"You can stop this, you know," came Richard, sounding almost compassionate through a thin mist of anger. "Leave Manhattan. Don't ever come back. Then it's done."

"Manhattan's my blood, you know that. Manhattan has fed me, held me, loved me, kept me. That's more than I could say for anyone else."

"Anyone?"

"Okay, maybe not... But you know what I mean. Anyway, how's New York's finest treating you?"

"Listen, Marcus, I know in your line of work you learn to hate this badge I wear, to you it's just a symbol of an enemy, an obstacle. But to me it means more, it's something I've accomplished, something I've made of myself."

"No, it's something you were made into."

"And what about you? What were you made into? A petty thief? A hired madman? You'd better just pray that when you go down, which you will, it's not by me. This means more to me now than anything else has."

"You can keep your little piece, it's just a symbol of how you got beat."

Richard turned suddenly, slapped Marcus across his face and lifted him by the lapels of his trench coat, ran him into the metal grate of a store front. "IT IS A SYMBOL OF HOW I'VE SURVIVED."

Marcus sneered a little as his feet were set back to the ground, wiping the blood from his lower lip with thh back of his sleeve. "A symbol?" he laughed. "Would you like to see a SYMBOL, Sgt. Richard Braven, NYPD? This is a symbol of survival..." He lifted his neck and made a slashing motion across the thick scar running from his left ear to his right. "This is a symbol..." He lifted his shirt, jabbing the index finger at the circular puff of skin just below his rib cage. "THIS IS..."

"Marcus, please..."

Marcus paused and stared. His breath was short and raspy, the blood and saliva mixing and flaring out with each exhale, like little fireworks on his own personal 4th of July.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to slap you."

"I'm sure... We really should have these talks more than once a year."

"Marcus, I said I'm sorry."

"Yeah, me too."

Richard pulled his wallet from his inside jacket pocket, opened it. The badge shone like a sun, reflected in the streetlights. He took out two 20s and put them in Marcus's hand. "Get something to eat, you've lost weight."

There was kindness in Richard's face as he turned, but the undercurrent showed in the tenseness of his burstingly shaking muscles.

"Richie...," Marcus started, and Richard stopped at the curb, turned--just his head--slowly. Had Marcus been a softer man there would have been at least one tear to burn down his face, but that's just not the way it comes down sometimes. "When you see Mom, you tell her I love her, okay?"

"She knows, Marcus. I hope I see you next year."

fox tv's nepatoday.com review and interview

2006-03-26T04:44:00.000-05:00

PLAINS, Pa. (NEPAtoday.com ) - Jay Morgans has grown both as a man and as an musician. While other artists pack in their bags for careers outside their hearts and dreams, Morgans holds fast and gives the world another chance.

Listening to The Morgans Project: 4 Track Demos, it's hard to imagine he grew up on angry, gritty punk rock anthems. You're more likely to think of the four piece art band hailing from Andy Warhol's Factory The Velvet Underground, instead of the Dead Kennedys, but every musician needs a place to start, a place to find where they belong.

Emotions set to words and poetry set to music, 4 Track Demos is the creative, all original music of one local native, Jay Morgans..

Why music, why not baseball, art or teaching?
Morgans: I needed to do something and it just happened to come out that way.

Let's say I've never see you perform, how would you describe your sound to me?
Morgans: The Music, it's stripped down bare and sparse. I'm not really sure if it's supposed to be that way or if it happened that way. It's like poetry, but with no certain form, the words they make you feel like at times you just want to get away.

Is The Morgans Project now a solo act?
Morgans: Even though my brother moved to Philadelphia, I still say we all the time, it's like I'm talking about my other personalities ... but for now it's me.

Where do you find inspiration from?
Morgans: Life in general, everything is a song waiting to happen. Like Denny's, 18 things may have happened by the time I leave and each one can be a song, whether or not it works, that's a different story. Musician's there's Lou Reed, The Velvet Underground. I grew up on three cord punk rock. Recently, Sublime and Blind Melon, bands I never thought I would like, as much as I did.

So how long have you been doing this?
Morgans: Well then I'd be telling you how old I really am... 12 years. I've been in a couple of different bands, but being on my own, doing something by myself, straight from thought to voice, it's all good.

Looking down the road, would you say no to fame?
Morgans: Probably saying that cheapens anyone you might have touched along the way, but I can't deny that having fame wouldn't upset me. I've gotten farther than I ever thought I would be and it's such a blessing. I'm not trying to change the world or anyone else with my music. In the end it doesn't matter, I can always go back to the factory, I'd still be doing something. It's frustrating and there's no denying that.

- Lee Ann Orsheski

now.com's mp3tv review

2006-03-26T04:41:00.000-05:00

The Morgans Project

After flirting with various styles, these two brothers seem to have found their definitive sound.

Musical Pros

The Morgans Project consist of Jay and Jesse Morgans. Both contribute vocals and acoustic guitar, with occasional input from other musicians. This isn't the brothers' first incarnation - there has been a variety of styles and names on the way. But they seem to have settled down and struck the proverbial chord with their recent acoustic work.

Apart from racking up the Number Three slot on MP3tv and the Riffage Alternative Chart, the guys have launched their debut CD, entitled Nothing Should Happen Ever.

Musical Cons

Jay and Jesse are thankful bad reviews only ever seem to come from "bartenders and ex-girlfriends". Just how many bartenders and ex-girlfriends they have is a closely guarded secret!

Judging by some of their gig antics, they may have escaped the critics lightly. MP3tv has learned Jay has a tendency to "sleep through tour dates", while Jesse often arrives late for a show and begins his sound check in the middle of Jay's set!

"Quote Unquote"

"Emotion-laced and soulful lyrics bonded to creative
acoustic styling fuel the tracks." - Michael Faillace

losing at rebound

2006-03-26T04:24:00.000-05:00

what would be winter
without cold rain
and walking in it?

He looked up from his napkin parchment, pausing mid-verse as the diner cook walked by.

"What's going on buddy," the cook asked, neither lifting his head nor pausing in his stride.

"Cold rain and ice."

"Yeah, I know what you mean," the cook answered, his pace eventually faltering, his eyes now taking in the sights of the nearby window: a shimmering summer day. A moment of pondering later, he was back on his way to the kitchen.

Billy folded the napkin carefully as if it were a holy relic before sliding it into his front pocket. He saw her coming through the glass doorway across the diner and watched as she crossed the floor, taking special note of her feline grace, her velvet ankle-length dress, her lace cardigan. She looked like she shouldn't be there, like she should be floating above a place like this raining glitter and angelic whispers down to the rest of us.

"Hello, William," were her slow words as she slid herself easily into the booth across from him.

"Ariella, hello," he started, becoming instantly uncomfortable with everything about himself. He could fell the lack of proportion to his face, feel from the inside out his own gawky stare and lanky, useless limbs and their awkward movements. There was no realistic way for him to peel all of himself and his history and the rest of the things that happened only behind his eyelids from the all of her as soon as she walked into a room.

"I saw the most beautiful sky last night," she began telling him, as smoothly as if she were finishing a conversation they'd already started. "The clouds were thick and blue-grey as the moon was coming out, but the little pieces of sun that were left was reflecting of the clouds like caresses in reds and purples and oranges and I just stood, I just stood and watched the clouds move and the reflections shift. Then I thought of you, and how you might see it, and it was beautiful all over again.

There is no word big enough to explain the overwhelming breeze of her voice and the words it carried. She spoke like a child, with all the comfort of heaven and all the wonder of a newborn's eyes, yet the words fell loose and wise and wet from a woman's lips. The trouble with development is that most people develop right out of that kind of beauty very early in life, but she seemed to have escaped most of those traps unscathed.

"I wish I was there." That was the best he could do, and not for lack of words.

"So do I," she said. Billy hadn't seen that kind of sincerity since Steven, the school bully in third grade, cornered him in the hallway and told him there was no Santa Claus. He had cried that day, and he felt like might again.

It had been like this for weeks. Every day they would meet, sit across form each other for hours, always almost catching a shining intimacy, an intimacy that bolted indecisively in the spaced between them like a lightning bug, erratic and smiling like a jester with a secret, daring them both to try to break his glow code. They were feeling each other out, each trying to make sure beyond doubt that the other was real, or even just really there.

Even their conversations about the simple, the everyday, the miniscule and overlooked, the words met words and more words until finally a sentence was born. Sentences that split skin wide open to pour out every last trickle of truth or being, be it understood or not.

They gave to each other every static notion and event that came to pass in each other's absence. At those dirty, smoke-filled, coffee-stained rooms filled with lunatics mulling in the heavy air of dying dreams, in at least one corner there was a shard of beauty that would not be contained, not be denied, that would shine in every shadow that all other light would fear.

"I've got to get going," she said. The words came fast and with a crack, like the frozen moment of falling into the quick, clean break of a bone. "I'm going to the ballet tonight with Tim, you met him didn't you?"

His skeleton lost all shape and he slumped back slightly with a clatter. "Well I certainly hope you two have a good time."

"What is it?" she asked, sitting back down, an honest concern in her voice that felt like honey on a tongue.

"No, no, nothing, all I'm saying is I think that's nice. People should experience each other as often as possible, really, it seems it always plays out fantastic." He hated the weight of his jaw. He hated the sick gravity pushing his forehead downward.

"Then I suppose I'll be going."

He wondered if she wanted him to stop her, he wondered why he would have to.

He watched her form walk out the open door. She was silhouetted by the sun outside, making her look like just one more lithe shadow sneaking through the world.

For all their levels and angles of "same," the one difference between them suddenly bubbled to the top of his thought, a rolling boil with a mocking chuckle: He was a part of her searching, while she was a part of his being found.

Waterfalls ceased their flow all over the world as he pulled the napkin from his pocket and let it drop to the floor.

It was coming together now. There was the quickness in which she took to him. Her adoration was always a merchant's scale, he balanced precariously on one end, some piece of her past weighing down the other.

He was at the low end of a rebound, and, like everything else that bounces, she was springing upward and away.

The trouble with relationships is that the only easy cure for a bad one is another one. It's like drinking rum all day to cure a hangover—you spend your healing time sliding and blurred and when it all clears up you're fucked all over again.

And the bottle is empty.

Billy reached for the ashtray and put his cigarette out, standing and dropping his money on the counter in one instinctive motion. He passed through the open door as directly as he could into the summer day. The breeze captured him instantly, and he missed her already.

The sky above him was a clear blue usually reserved for funerals, and the sun was still up there-some kind of reassurance. He heard the heels of his boots clicking the pavement before he even realized he was walking. The sounds quickened, and he was running. The grass, the street, the tiny atoms and pieces of life all passed beneath his shadow faster and faster.

At the diner, the cook swept the floor dutifully, whistling through the cigarette dangling on his lower lip. For no reason in particular, he squatted down and picked up a curious scrap of napkin from the floor:
what would be winter
without cold rain
and walking in it?

He looked out the window once again at the brilliant and relentless sun outside. He shook off the sudden chill that struck him. He continued sweeping.

"Losing at Rebound"
©1997 Jay Morgans