Wouldn't it be really interesting if people started wearing Calvin Klein
clothing as an anti-cop statement? ...not that I'd condone such a
thing...
Friday, November 13, 2015
Tuesday, June 23, 2015
A long-overdue letter to my parents
Mr. and Mrs. xxxxxx
2 xxxxxxx Dr.
RaMS.
For the first time in my life I am going to speak to you honestly. Straightforward, just as you have all my life, not worrying about my feelings because you think I need to hear what you have to say.
All of your life you have been a spoiled-child. When you don’t get your way, you make life hell for everyone around you. You throw tantrums like a three year-old and if that doesn’t work, you start bullying people into doing what you want. I will tell you now, Just like you used to tell me when I would watch my soap-operas: Quit acting like a bitch!
Get in control of your emotions! I am not responsible for your feelings, you are! Plenty of shit hasn’t gone my way in the last 47 years, but I NEVER took it out on anyone else. I sucked that shit up and let them have their way. I made myself sick doing it too.
I’m not doing it anymore. If you can’t get control of yourself, I’m sorry. Fuck you. Your father was a drunk?
Boo-fucking-hoo! At least the motherfucker had balls enough to take off. My father was a drunk and he stuck around. He and his wife belittled me all the time. For all the years that I felt like blowing my brains out in school, I would come home and I couldn’t get any peace or support from my own parents! How do you think that makes me feel? Oh I forgot, children don’t have feelings.
What the fuck did you have children for if you weren’t going to treat them right? I’m sorry, I came along and spoiled your party. I didn’t ask to come here!
You used to have parties, and invite people into your home. These people would talk to me, and I would talk back. Then you’d get mad. Tell me to leave other people alone. Laugh at me in front of your friends and make jokes about how you brought me into this world, and you could take me out and make another just like me! Or else you’d find me later on, during the party, in my room, and whip me for talking to the people! Think about that shit!
Mrs. Frank you ain’t no angel either! You stayed with a motherfucker who was jealous of his own son! You turned your back on me so you wouldn’t have to deal with your relationship! I haven’t had a mother since I was ten years old!
Do you remember when you two sat me down, when I was about nine years-old, and asked me how I would feel if you didn’t live together anymore. I told you that I’t didn’t matter and that it was up to you. You both had the fucking nerve to get mad at me, because I didn’t give you an excuse to stay together by crying, and begging for things to work! Do you remember that shit? Probably not. ASll that shit rolls off your back, it’s in your past! I ate your shit for all of my life, and just at the age of 45 was able to start letting it out and crying and dealing with things.
Now I can’t even visit you because when I visit my father locks himself in his room, or stares off into a daydream. And my mother acts like a lunatic. Criticizing my every action. Telling me not to go out at night because the neighbors didn’t know me and might shoot! Do you think I’m a dumb motherfucker? I’m not. I know I’m not what you wanted! You have made it abundantly clear by your actions that you’d prefer to have a son like Adisa. He is a joy, and I am a duty.
I am what I am. I don’t hurt anyone. I try to make people happy with what I do. I try to make people think, through my books. I never lashed out at anyone out of emotion. Until today! This is my 47 year speech! I never could say shit because you would beat me for what I would say. My opinion never mattered. I saw how other people had relationships with their parents, and how those parents would deal with their kids. And all the time, you have this fucked-up idea that compassionate-parenting was a white thing, and that it would make a kid spoiled. Spoiled like you, Mr. Frank? You actually thought that because you didn’t break my arms, and sent me to a Lutheran-school that you weren’t abusing me? You cant compare other people’s shit with yours and feel righteous cause yours didn’t stink as much!
My life has been shitty until very recently, when I decided to let all of this go, and take care of my own well-being. I have to. I ain’t having a stroke because my parents belittle my spiritual beliefs, or my ideas, and tell me to my face that I don’t know what I’m talking about , because I don’t have a diploma from some white people that says I know something. I can tell you something and you toss it away and argue with me about it. A year later you will hear it from a pastor or somebody on the radio and think it’s the most brilliant shit you’ve ever heard! How do you think that makes me feel?
I’ve appreciated and thanked you for the financial support you’ve given me when I was destitute, but if I have to keep putting up with your emotional blackmail, you AND your wife, you can keep your money. Stick it up your ass. It ain’t worth it to me! You can pat yourself on the back for throwing money at me, or you can deal with your son like a person. Period!
I’m Done with it. If you don’t want to act like two adults, then leave me alone! Don’t talk to me any more. Don’t call me with any bullshit, or attitude or butt-hurt. Suck that shit up, just like you’ve made me do all my life! If you can’t act right, look at yourselves and realize that you are not right, that you cannot admit your own faults, then don’t talk to me anymore. Take me out of the will. Give everything to Marcellus, or Adisa. I don’t want it. BYE!
-CF
2 xxxxxxx Dr.
RaMS.
For the first time in my life I am going to speak to you honestly. Straightforward, just as you have all my life, not worrying about my feelings because you think I need to hear what you have to say.
All of your life you have been a spoiled-child. When you don’t get your way, you make life hell for everyone around you. You throw tantrums like a three year-old and if that doesn’t work, you start bullying people into doing what you want. I will tell you now, Just like you used to tell me when I would watch my soap-operas: Quit acting like a bitch!
Get in control of your emotions! I am not responsible for your feelings, you are! Plenty of shit hasn’t gone my way in the last 47 years, but I NEVER took it out on anyone else. I sucked that shit up and let them have their way. I made myself sick doing it too.
I’m not doing it anymore. If you can’t get control of yourself, I’m sorry. Fuck you. Your father was a drunk?
Boo-fucking-hoo! At least the motherfucker had balls enough to take off. My father was a drunk and he stuck around. He and his wife belittled me all the time. For all the years that I felt like blowing my brains out in school, I would come home and I couldn’t get any peace or support from my own parents! How do you think that makes me feel? Oh I forgot, children don’t have feelings.
What the fuck did you have children for if you weren’t going to treat them right? I’m sorry, I came along and spoiled your party. I didn’t ask to come here!
You used to have parties, and invite people into your home. These people would talk to me, and I would talk back. Then you’d get mad. Tell me to leave other people alone. Laugh at me in front of your friends and make jokes about how you brought me into this world, and you could take me out and make another just like me! Or else you’d find me later on, during the party, in my room, and whip me for talking to the people! Think about that shit!
Mrs. Frank you ain’t no angel either! You stayed with a motherfucker who was jealous of his own son! You turned your back on me so you wouldn’t have to deal with your relationship! I haven’t had a mother since I was ten years old!
Do you remember when you two sat me down, when I was about nine years-old, and asked me how I would feel if you didn’t live together anymore. I told you that I’t didn’t matter and that it was up to you. You both had the fucking nerve to get mad at me, because I didn’t give you an excuse to stay together by crying, and begging for things to work! Do you remember that shit? Probably not. ASll that shit rolls off your back, it’s in your past! I ate your shit for all of my life, and just at the age of 45 was able to start letting it out and crying and dealing with things.
Now I can’t even visit you because when I visit my father locks himself in his room, or stares off into a daydream. And my mother acts like a lunatic. Criticizing my every action. Telling me not to go out at night because the neighbors didn’t know me and might shoot! Do you think I’m a dumb motherfucker? I’m not. I know I’m not what you wanted! You have made it abundantly clear by your actions that you’d prefer to have a son like Adisa. He is a joy, and I am a duty.
I am what I am. I don’t hurt anyone. I try to make people happy with what I do. I try to make people think, through my books. I never lashed out at anyone out of emotion. Until today! This is my 47 year speech! I never could say shit because you would beat me for what I would say. My opinion never mattered. I saw how other people had relationships with their parents, and how those parents would deal with their kids. And all the time, you have this fucked-up idea that compassionate-parenting was a white thing, and that it would make a kid spoiled. Spoiled like you, Mr. Frank? You actually thought that because you didn’t break my arms, and sent me to a Lutheran-school that you weren’t abusing me? You cant compare other people’s shit with yours and feel righteous cause yours didn’t stink as much!
My life has been shitty until very recently, when I decided to let all of this go, and take care of my own well-being. I have to. I ain’t having a stroke because my parents belittle my spiritual beliefs, or my ideas, and tell me to my face that I don’t know what I’m talking about , because I don’t have a diploma from some white people that says I know something. I can tell you something and you toss it away and argue with me about it. A year later you will hear it from a pastor or somebody on the radio and think it’s the most brilliant shit you’ve ever heard! How do you think that makes me feel?
I’ve appreciated and thanked you for the financial support you’ve given me when I was destitute, but if I have to keep putting up with your emotional blackmail, you AND your wife, you can keep your money. Stick it up your ass. It ain’t worth it to me! You can pat yourself on the back for throwing money at me, or you can deal with your son like a person. Period!
I’m Done with it. If you don’t want to act like two adults, then leave me alone! Don’t talk to me any more. Don’t call me with any bullshit, or attitude or butt-hurt. Suck that shit up, just like you’ve made me do all my life! If you can’t act right, look at yourselves and realize that you are not right, that you cannot admit your own faults, then don’t talk to me anymore. Take me out of the will. Give everything to Marcellus, or Adisa. I don’t want it. BYE!
-CF
Monday, June 15, 2015
Tad Martin reviewed in the Comics Journal!
After all these years I finally get some notice from the comics community at large. It comes in the form of a great review, from the fingers of Bob Levin. Read here!
Monday, May 4, 2015
The Legend of Ugly Charlie
When
I was a little kid, I was a student at St. Peter's Lutheran School on the South
side of
Chicago.
It was me and 200 other little black boys and girls in Navy-blue slacks and
ties, or
Navy-blue
tartan dresses. The school was built onto the Church building, as is the way of
the
Lutherans.
A honeycombed warren of dark stairways, dark wood floors, and plaster walls.
As
children, we were about average. Not too bad nor too good. We did our dirt, but
it was the
horrific
communal dirt of children in general. But because black people used to openly
admit
their
social conservatism, these dirty deeds would only go so far before they were
met with a
show
of overwhelming force. In the case of St. Peter's Lutheran School, the force
was in "Ugly
Charlie".
Ugly
Charlie was the agreed upon form of punishment from on high [being the
concerted
efforts
of our parents, teachers and pastors to not raise us like those heathen-niglets
that tore
through
the South and West sides like disrespectful earth-toned tornadoes.]
Ugly
Charlie was a belt. Let me rephrase that; Ugly Charlie was a BELT. Someone had
chosen a
wide
brown belt to be the instrument of disciplinary administration.
Someone
had chosen to take a wide brown belt, fold it in half (so that it was creased
on one
end)
so you had double the leather to spank.
Someone
had chosen to take a wide brown belt, fold it in half [(so that it was creased
on one
end)
so you had double the leather to spank the palm of a child's hand].
Someone
had chosen to take a wide brown belt, fold it in half {[(so that it was creased
on one
end)
so you had double the leather to spank the palm of a child's hand] as many
times as that
particular
teacher felt was necessary}.
And
"someone" named that brown belt, "Ugly Charlie".
Who
the person was, I don't know. I do know that Ugly Charlie had been in existence
when my
Father
was attending St. Peter's Lutheran School, as a little kid. So this belt had
the force of at
least
20 years of legend behind it.
I
was a conscientious child. I tried to avoid evil, but my mind wandered. So when
the black
teacher-ladies
(if they had been Catholic they would have been Nuns) would say, "Idle
hands
are
the Devil's Workshop" my little kid mind had no problem inventing a flesh
and blood
boogeyman
called "Satan" to torment me for the next 30 years.
It
was on one of these wanderings of mind that I didn't do my homework properly
one day. I
seem
to remember it as a sort of meta-situation in which I discovered a loophole to
the
teachers
homework algorithm, which I thereby, proudly, exploited. And seeing as how
little
black
children that are smarter than their black teacher-ladies are indicative of the
Village of
the
Damned, or at the very least are "acting smart", the indicated
intellect intervention was, of
course,
Ugly Charlie.
So,
to BE the child that you had seen so, so many times before, as the eponymous,
"Dead Man
Walking"
is a reality-fractalizing proposition. I walked the runway of glaring white
light,
between
kids' desks, towards the hulking Miss Knott. She was nearing 30 and unmarried,
so
back
then you knew she was either evil or ugly or both. She was both.
1She
sat impatiently at her desk, tight red and white floral-printed dress
attempting to hold in
the
gargantuan coffee-colored waves of fat-layered muscles. Her eyes were hooded
and
unsmiling.
She wore a medium-sized afro and seemed to me to be some horrible cannibal
woman.
I don't know what I expected, but not this- *WHOP!*
She'd
somehow grabbed my hand, holding my little fingers crushed together in her
angry fist,
while
her other hand sent white hot light into my soul via the palm of my hand. And
again-
*WHOP!*
she did it with a popping sound that seemed indecently loud. All of the other
little
snot-nosed
boys and girls staring at me. It was as though I were naked. And again she-
*WHOP!*
slapped/whipped/beat the palm of my nine year-old hand, and she continued for
another
27 beats. And though I realized that the punishment was supposed to be the belt
on
my
palm, I knew that the real punishment was the passive-aggressive grinding
together of my
finger
bones, that rhymed too perfectly with her angry grin. But I had learned my
lesson that
day, at least for a
while, and didn't mention to her, or anyone else that I knew.
Friday, March 20, 2015
Thursday, January 22, 2015
Tad 6, update
Blurb:
"Casanova Frankenstein reclaims the confessional, auto-bio comic book and transcends the well worn shock of self-exploitation. He demonstrates the raw power of the comic book form by disolving genre tropes and reader expectations. His ink bears witness to the allness of life, the ambiguity and messiness, and does not define any one thing in order to manipulate or stear your emotions. And I defy you not cry while reading this! This is the language of the heart."
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
The flies
When I was a boy
between seven and ten
Years old
I had a reoccurring problem.
Flies would fly
into my
ears.
And as bad as that
sounds
Think of it from
my perspective…
The first time, I was
standing on the front
porch of my
childhood home.
I looked to my
right
and saw a fly,
clear as a slow-motion
black bullet
heading my way.
And because I could
not have
conceived
that it could
happen,
I turned my head
forward.
And then
a
"FLUMP", noise
like a door closing
inside my
head.
And then-
Thebuzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…
How to explain
such a thing
to the people around
me?
I know that I
said,
"BUG IN MY EAR!!"
but why was
it
necessary
for me to have to say it
more than
Once?
And why was everyone so
calm?
I was taken upstairs to
the bathroom with
visions of the fly
burrowing deeper and
deeper into my
brain
and my mother trying to fish it
out with tweezers
or some other
eardrum puncturing
utensil.
But instead she turned my
head
sideways and
poured water into
my ear from
a glass.
And the insane buzzing
bubbled and
stopped.
She then turned my
bug-ear
floorward and
a warm flood of liquid
ran down my cheek and onto
the floor
the fly in the middle
of the puddle.
For the next several nights
I was plagued
by surreal nightmares. I slept on
my side
with a finger jammed in one ear
and the other ear buried in the pillow.
The sound of the pillowcase
crinkling Under my ear
a million bug eggs
falling out.
To think such an event is traumatic
is an understatement, so
when it happened
AGAIN
I felt that there bugs could smell
how scared I was.
The second bug
(a fly)
landed on my ear-lobe
and then
crawled into my ear!
Once more I was in a
panic!
I ran into the house
through the living room, into the kitchen
where my mother was
washing dishes.
She was calm.
Too calm for my liking
as she got a glass
Of water and
led me onto the back
porch.
I tilted my buzzing ear
skyward
She poured in the water.
BZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
gloop gloop
A Sound of being under water
Bzz brzk-
…
And when I tilted my water
filled ear down
and the warm waxy water
flowed down my neck
I looked to the ground
at the puddle on
the porch-slats.
Water but
no FLY…
But I felt nothing in my
ear.
The bug must
have fallen
through the
Slats…
?
It made no sense.
Once was horrifying.
Twice was impossible.
So the third time…
I was climbing the big
oak tree in
my grandmother’s backyard
with my friend
Ben, when the
fun was inturrupted by
A loud flurping
Burzzzzszzzzzzzzzzzz…
I looked over at Ben
and said
calmly
"Excuse me a second. I got
a fly in my ear.”
With that, I haul
myself down from the tree
across the yard
into the house
past family
up the stairs
down the hallway and into
the bathroom.
The whole time
Brzzzz, brzzzzz, brz…
I turned on the sink faucet
tilted my head
and scooped water into
my ear. And listened
to the underwater sound
and the end of the buzzing.
I tilted my ear
floorward and
the water ran out.
The dead fly in a puddle of water
on the counter.
I examined it.
It was just a fly.
I went back outside.
Ben had left.
It was okay though.
Real men knew how to
go it alone.
between seven and ten
Years old
I had a reoccurring problem.
Flies would fly
into my
ears.
And as bad as that
sounds
Think of it from
my perspective…
The first time, I was
standing on the front
porch of my
childhood home.
I looked to my
right
and saw a fly,
clear as a slow-motion
black bullet
heading my way.
And because I could
not have
conceived
that it could
happen,
I turned my head
forward.
And then
a
"FLUMP", noise
like a door closing
inside my
head.
And then-
Thebuzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…
How to explain
such a thing
to the people around
me?
I know that I
said,
"BUG IN MY EAR!!"
but why was
it
necessary
for me to have to say it
more than
Once?
And why was everyone so
calm?
I was taken upstairs to
the bathroom with
visions of the fly
burrowing deeper and
deeper into my
brain
and my mother trying to fish it
out with tweezers
or some other
eardrum puncturing
utensil.
But instead she turned my
head
sideways and
poured water into
my ear from
a glass.
And the insane buzzing
bubbled and
stopped.
She then turned my
bug-ear
floorward and
a warm flood of liquid
ran down my cheek and onto
the floor
the fly in the middle
of the puddle.
For the next several nights
I was plagued
by surreal nightmares. I slept on
my side
with a finger jammed in one ear
and the other ear buried in the pillow.
The sound of the pillowcase
crinkling Under my ear
a million bug eggs
falling out.
To think such an event is traumatic
is an understatement, so
when it happened
AGAIN
I felt that there bugs could smell
how scared I was.
The second bug
(a fly)
landed on my ear-lobe
and then
crawled into my ear!
Once more I was in a
panic!
I ran into the house
through the living room, into the kitchen
where my mother was
washing dishes.
She was calm.
Too calm for my liking
as she got a glass
Of water and
led me onto the back
porch.
I tilted my buzzing ear
skyward
She poured in the water.
BZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
gloop gloop
A Sound of being under water
Bzz brzk-
…
And when I tilted my water
filled ear down
and the warm waxy water
flowed down my neck
I looked to the ground
at the puddle on
the porch-slats.
Water but
no FLY…
But I felt nothing in my
ear.
The bug must
have fallen
through the
Slats…
?
It made no sense.
Once was horrifying.
Twice was impossible.
So the third time…
I was climbing the big
oak tree in
my grandmother’s backyard
with my friend
Ben, when the
fun was inturrupted by
A loud flurping
Burzzzzszzzzzzzzzzzz…
I looked over at Ben
and said
calmly
"Excuse me a second. I got
a fly in my ear.”
With that, I haul
myself down from the tree
across the yard
into the house
past family
up the stairs
down the hallway and into
the bathroom.
The whole time
Brzzzz, brzzzzz, brz…
I turned on the sink faucet
tilted my head
and scooped water into
my ear. And listened
to the underwater sound
and the end of the buzzing.
I tilted my ear
floorward and
the water ran out.
The dead fly in a puddle of water
on the counter.
I examined it.
It was just a fly.
I went back outside.
Ben had left.
It was okay though.
Real men knew how to
go it alone.
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