Saturday, February 25, 2012

BLACK COAT & TAILS (IF LOOKS COULD KILL)





Like a magician, he's up to his old tricks,
another show, another fix.
His heart's in a box
bound by a thousand and one locks.
His world is whirling and about to tilt.
The knives are in all the way to the hilt.
He'd let them go but he doesn't know how.
If looks could kill, he'd be a ghost by now...

From the shadows, he calls out your name.
Just one shot and you're back in the game.
Your heart's in a box
bound by a thousand and one locks.
Your world is whirling and about to tilt.
The knives are in all the way to the hilt.
You'd let them go but you don't know how.
If looks could kill, you'd be a ghost by now...



Friday, February 10, 2012

Transformation


We drift out into a world of clouds  
and unending water, 

of ghosts 
that hover and then descend, 

and with each breath 
enter into us, 

until there is nothing left to name 
or to remember, 

until there are no more spells 
left to be broken.




  







         



Wednesday, February 8, 2012

THE BLUE POET

DOWNLOAD THE BLUE POET PDF formatted screenplay

THE BLUE POET  (WGAw #984754) 

Haunted by the ghosts of the past, a young musician turns to drugs.

Set in the mid seventies (except for flashbacks from the Kennedy era), and in the spirit of REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE and ORDINARY PEOPLE, THE BLUE POET tells the story of a young man haunted by both the Kennedy assassination & the death of his own father in a drunken car crash.

SYNOPSIS: JESSE SANDSTROM, 17, sings and plays bass for one of the most promising rock bands in the Twin Cities (with the help of his best friend FRANKIE O'REILLY on guitar). But Jesse wants to leave the band behind and study art in Paris. Jesse's mother, MARY SANDSTROM, 37, tells Jesse they do not have the money to send Jesse to Paris. However Jesse's musician grandfather, GUS CHRISTIANS, 60s, encourages Jesse to apply. But just as Jesse sends in his application, his sister, ANNIE SANDSTROM, 14, is diagnosed with Non Hodgkin's Lymphoma.

At Saint Mary's hospital in Saint Paul, Jesse meets SISTER MARY FRANCIS and is asked to play at the Christmas party in the children's ward. There Annie (completely bald after her chemo treatments) sings and plays on piano a hilarious version of "A Natural Woman"; and Jesse performs a touching rendition of "Tiny Dancer" with the help of a frail, leukemia patient, SARAH, 8.

After a gig at a ski resort overlooking Lake Superior, Jesse engages in a night of sex and drugs with an older couple, VAL and BRIAN, and shoots heroin for the first time. When Frankie slips up and tells their mutual friend, RENEE, about Jesse's night with Val and Brian (not realizing that Renee and Jesse are now together), Jesse quits the band.

As Annie's illness progresses, so does Jesse's addiction to heroin. In the hospital near death Annie gives Jesse a rosary and asks him to pray with her. Jesse says nothing but cannot bring himself to pray. After Annie's funeral Jesse turns, once again, to drugs and overdoses on Annie's leftover morphine. He has visions of his dead father. As he lays unconscious on the floor, Jesse in a dream state converses with THE BLUE POET, a name he gave Robert Frost when as a boy he watched the Kennedy inaugural in a darkened basement and the flickering images on the screen turned the room blue.

Mary Sandstrom discovers Jesse near death and calls an ambulance..

Sister Mary Francis visits Jesse in the hospital after the overdose and emphasizes the importance of his artistic vocation and encourages him to seek treatment for his problem with drugs.

After treatment, Mary Sandstrom finds Jesse's accepted application & makes arrangements for Jesse to study in Paris.

And still later: a Minneapolis nightclub. The crowd calls out for an encore. Faces stare expectantly at the stage. Jesse reconciled with his former bandmates comes on stage. The crowd CHEERS...

Flash forward to the Paris Metro. Jesse enters the Metro. He is startled by an approaching train, sparks shooting off from the base of the train as it emerges from the dark tunnel. Jesse makes his way to Notre Dame (the rosary Annie gave him in his hand). Jesse puts the rosary around his neck as he enters Notre Dame.

GHOSTS IN WINTER

What do I care about Prozac and depression, price controls
and the unemployment rate (blue voices in a dark room),

while a lost girl wades through drifts and drifts of Minnesota snow
and apparitions huddle high above the frozen river?