brianomnidillon.com

And the last. I love my mothafuckin GIRLS…

To Whom It May Concern,  

      For the past six months, I have been fortunate to call Brian “Omni” Dillon my coach. As a third year veteran in the college slam poetry scene, I have been asked many times why the team even needs a coach. To be honest, I wasn’t completely sure of all the role encompasses. I saw him or her as a part of the team who handles the administrative aspect and would sometimes critique my work a bit more than my peers. Although my past coaches were helpful, Omni has revamped what it means to be a poetry coach.

      Omni has been doing slam and writing poetry long before most of us knew what the art form was. His passion hasn’t ceased since the day he wrote his first poem. Those on the team see him get on stage and he captivates us; we want to, one day, be able to perform, write and captivate an audience like he can. With all that he is accomplished, he has never taken a patronizing role. He knows when to be authoritative and when to be our peer. He gives us a coach’s support while still staying on our level and relating to us. Because of that quality, there is never a lack of respect or trust from both ends of the spectrum and I know it would be the same in any classroom.

      Another great aspect of his character is his dedication to the art form and to his team. He strives off of a good line, a good performance or a good response from an audience. He has pushed us past where we thought we could go with our poetry by making us try different forums that we didn’t know existed. He has taken us out of the college campus and brought us to other venues like the Nuyorican Poets Café, the place where slam started in New York City. It was an honor for all of us just to perform there and we may not have been able to do so without Omni’s knowledge and organizational skills. His ability to keep all the administrative aspects in check allows us to relax when we have a big show but he also tells us what needs to be done, like booking venues or performing in our classes. By doing so, he is teaching us the business aspect of the art which is allowing us to become well-rounded poets. I’m sure Omni will expose his students to the different aspects of the art form as well.

      In terms of our writing, Omni has made himself available to critique our poetry round the clock. Whether it is through an e-mail or a phone call, I know I can count on him to give me and honest, intellectual opinion of my piece. And because of his experience with the art, I know I am getting advice from a skilled poet. He knows the formula to a perfect slam piece and sculpts it to fit us individually. He will do that with his students as well. He can take anyone nervous of a stage and show them how to cultivate those nerves into energy for a performance. I truly believe he can break the shyest of children out of his or her shell because he gives us confidence.

      There can be no one better for a poetry teacher than Brian “Omni” Dillon because I cannot even articulate the lessons he has given me. I can say, with the utmost honesty, his moral support has pushed me to write my best work and give my best performance. Even if I have trouble, he still makes me feel like I have succeeded as a poet with his encouraging words. Because of him, I consider myself more of a poet than I ever did. I believe any student would be lucky to have him as a teacher just like I am lucky to have him as my coach and my friend.  

 Tracy Soren

Email: TracySoren@gmail.com

AAAAAAAND Here’s another… To Whom It May Concern, As founder of the SUNY New Paltz Spoken Word Team, Brian Dillon has been a key leader in the development of the team and the community of artists in New Paltz. He has even come back to help the team after it fell into the hands of leaders that were unable to handle the ever demanding responsibility and dedication it takes to run the program. Without him, the spoken word community would still remain underground and remote. He has help spread the art of spoken word from being willing to perform his work on street corners, to holding formal programs. He is the most willing and dedicated man that I know, and his true love and passion for spoken word shines through his actions and bubbly personality. Brian is very easy to get along with, and as the current President of the New Paltz Spoken Word team, he has been there every step of the way for me. From daily e-mails just checking in on my day, to making sure I have all of the resources I need to keep the program running, his reliability and commitment to the team is something that I would not be here today without. He works very closely with the new freshman of the team, as well, offering daily critiques of their work via phone call, e-mail, or his frequent visits to our weekly meetings. He is helping to teach the freshmen the leadership and craft skills that they will need to be future leaders within the spoken word community, as well as individuals in their daily lives. His warm personality immediately makes everyone in the room feel relaxed, offering a comfortable and positive atmosphere in which to work in. Kerri Shaffer President of the SUNY New Paltz Spoken Word Team shaffe75@newpaltz.edu

I’m off from my real job until Tuesday the third of Februay. Since I still don’t have a working internet connection that doesn’t have the word “BlackBerry” stamped on it, I will not be posting for at least a few days.

So what to leave you with? What else but people praising me?

I’m beginning to formulate plans for a business, running after-school poetry programs for high school kids. I am making my first proposal this week to a school in Suffolk and asked three of the girls I coached to write letters of recommendation for me.

Here they are. (cus i love myself so much)

Megan:

To Whom It May Concern:

Before I was formally introduced to Brian Dillon, known as “Omni” in the spoken word world, his literary talent as well as his commanding stage presence intimidated me.  He had been a slam poet for nearly a decade when we first encountered each other, while I was just learning what slam was.  Brian had a reputation for dominating the microphone at both regional and national competitions, as well as in one of the most famous slam venues, The Nuyorican Poet’s Café.  I was just getting started, and he was the best of the best.  I was in awe of his talents. 

However, as a mere freshman, when I graced the microphone he encouraged me with whistles, snaps, “whats!” and “wows!” (Which is a way to show encouragement and appreciation for words during a poem.)  When I stepped off the stage, he greeted me as if we had been friends for a long time, as if we were in the same poetic league, and my confidence increased immensely.  The building of self-esteem that Brian has provided me and other slam poets since I was eighteen years old has been a defining part of our relationship.  He sees a spark of something in each poet he meets and demands it to be ignited.  He believes in the poet even before they believe in themselves and he sees through that talent until they become a legend on their own.  Last week at The Nuyorican Poet’s Café I scored higher in a slam than my brilliant coach, and while the scores are subject to randomness, no part of me would say that I achieved that on my own.

Brian Dillon is the most dedicated person to the growth of slam poetry that I have ever met.  He works in Manhattan by day but everyone knows where his true passion lies.  He fills the e-mail inboxes of the team member’s with extensive workshop compliments and critiques on their poetry, and encourages them to write.  The keyboard on his cell phone is dwindled down to flatness because when he has no access on a computer, he text messages his workshops to the team.  Brian doesn’t live in New Paltz (where our team meets) so it would be conceivably impossible for him to be the coach, but honestly no one would ever know that is the case.  He attends as many meetings per month a possible, and just the other week he spent six hours traveling just to be at a Slam Team meeting for less than two hours.  He has surpassed any coach I have ever had before who have lived on the same campus as I do.  He is always available to us and he is a blessing and the backbone of our team.

His dedication and talent is only matched by his personality.  Put Brian in a room with twenty strangers and within ten minutes he will walk out with twenty best friends.  He is the warmest, friendliest, funniest person and finds something to relate to and communicate about in everyone he meets.  The freshmen on the team really respond to this, and everyone loves “Uncle Omni.”

I have no doubt that Brian Dillon would be the best person for a job that requires working with young minds because there is all the evidence to prove just how well he has done that before.

Thank You,

Megan Falley (kneepits@gmail.com)

ME: Can I get your name please

CUSTOMER: It’s Nicole…Nicole Harden…

ME: Great Nicole, and what’s your phone number?

CUSTOMER: No no no…Its hyphenated. Nicole Harden-Bent

Is this only funny to sophmoric idiots like me? Harden-Bent?? Really??

Strange experience this morning. I went to school. Again.

With the idea of grad school once again rearing it’s head in my regretful post-college brain, I have decided to fill out a few holes (i.e: F’s) in my New Paltz transcript. Now that I’m working a real grown-up job in Manhattan I can’t very well travel upstate three times a week, so I’m taking this single class @ Hunter College.

My professor is a 100% no doubt about it homosexual. Anyone who knows me, knows I see this as an absolute positive. Gay men love me (not like that). And I love gay men (not like that).

But it wasn’t his gayness that prompted this post. It was the first reading assignment on his syllabus:

waaaaiiiit for it…

wwaaaaaaaaaaaiiiitf for it:

BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN.

can’t make this shit up people. just can’t.

::i love my life::

To all my poet, artist, musician friends:

A good friend of mine (OK, we used to date) is a brilliantly gifted and endlessly generous businesswoman who is going to be doing some work for me soon and I’d like to show her off to those of you who may require her services.

FXVDIGITAL handles web & graphic design, photography, web programming, audio & video editing, logo design and a ton more. Their work is fucking brilliant and you’ll notice many of our associates among their customers.

Check out the site and when you realize, “Holy Shit, my site looks like a pile of shit compared to what these people turn out”, you can give them a shout and get your web presence corrected.

If you need more info, contact them…or just contact me.

Last night myself and some fellow members of the family went out to Central Islip to perform at a high school open mic at the invitation of one Candido Crespo (blog-devotees will be familiar with his work - but if you’re not…WILDBOY)

Dido teaches art at the school and it’s very clear he’s loved by his students. But this isn’t about how amazing Dido or his students are. This is about Fascious.

(FASCIOUS.COM)

At the close of the the open mic the organizers raffled off a gift basket of assorted nonsense. Likely being unhappy at the lack of attention he was recieving at the moment, Fascious stepped in and offered a copy of Penumbra for raffle. He said anybody who wanted to could put their name on a dollar bill and put it in a basket. The winner got a free copy of Penumbra (autographed…ofcourse)

All hell broke loose. Forty-nine high school sophmores poured over the seats and aisles in the high school’s theatre like rampaging cattle waving signed dollar bills in the air.

I gave Fascious the dirtiest possible look, while he twiddled his fingers, curled his moustache and laughed like every villain in every movie ever made.

Mwahahahah Yessss. Run little ones. Run for your master! Mwahahahah!!

If you don’t know Fascious, this story isn’t funny. But if you do…it’s fucking hillarious.

PS. real quick, if you need any information on which movies to go see, ask Fascious. Him and his boy Talib are the source for that information.

Fucking kid….

::sigh::

There are few things I’m better known for in spoken word than my mortal abhorrence of militant vegetarianism. I find the idea that a plant cannot suffer to be reprehensible and tantamount to homicidal mania. We all kill to live. We all use the bodies of the dead to keep living. No matter the number of fingers and toes - all things bleed - all things have mothers. So let me preface the following post with a healthy “Go Fuck  ourself” to the moralist vegans, PETA, and the rest of the racist, anti-plant mothafuckas…

That being said, my good friend Megan is a vegan. It’s a difficult thing being friednly with her sort of person. I’ve previously had my mind scrambled by questions like “You don’t eat eggs OR bacon?”, “NO CHEESE!?”, and “What does a vegan put on their bagels?”. I Can’t Believe It’s Not Food!

This cookies with soy milk existence is baffling to me. Regardless, we had dinner together Thursday night at Candle 79 on the Upper East Side.

My plan was simple: Challenge my unwitting waitress to a duel. I handed her my menu and told her to do her worst. I explained to her my carnivorous inclinations and gave her the only restriction of avoiding mushrooms (because I fucking hate mushrooms). Megan was in her element, eyes pushed into a thousand menu items featuring words that were another language to me. Seitan? Flaxseed? Tempeh? Cashew cheese? At least someone was confident in the meal to follow.

It began with wine. This being the one part of the process I was well versed in, I chose a Domaine Delmas Limoux Chardonnay, which was excellent and didn’t taste like it was lying to me at all. Grapes are honest fruit.

An appetizer of Guacamole Timbale was spectacular. Though I couldn’t tell you that this dish wouldn’t fall within my first law of food (Everything is better with bacon), I also would be lying if I told you it wasn’t something I would eat again. Because I would. Something that resembled the fried noodles you’ll see on any Chinese menu rested atop a curiously smooth and mouth-slicking guacamole studded with jicama and cucumber. Below this was a round of black beans and carmelized onions. The scene-stealer was a firey ranchero the drizzled outward from the plate’s center. In all honesty: very good.

Next was the main attraction. Our waitress selected a black pepper & balsamic grilled Seitan with potato-celeriac purée, and haricots verts (known to a normal human being as green beans). As previously blogged by Miss Megan Beth Falley, my response was one of confusion.

It certainly smelled like food. It even tasted like food. But it was LYING TO ME. For those fortunate enough to not already know, Seitan is a wheat protein product. Affectionally referred to as “wheat meat” (gross) by it’s devotees. It was clear that the chefs at Candle 79 knew how to handle the product when intended for the carnivorous. The outside of the “meat” was charred black, and it was married to a balsamic sauce which would not be out of place on any piece of red meat. So to the nose, it smelled salty and rich. To the toungue it was an explosion of charcoal and smoke and sweetness. But…to the teeth. Ohhh the teeth.

Seitan may come from wheat, but it must share some bloodline with it’s cousin, Jell-O. The consistency is that of fortified rubber, with an extra jiggle. While I promise you won’t anywhere find a more capable representation of green beans (haircots verts to the sophisticated) or celeriac and mashed potatos, I won’t sit here and tell you that this magical chef could turn wheat into meat any better than I can turn a noodle into a poodle. Meat bleeds. Wheat…sways in the wind? And afterall if a vegan restaurant can’t churn out some fuckin spectacular green beans then what are they really doing back there? Wheat-slaughter?

All in all I had a great time. The waitress was brilliant, seeing Megan in her own personal food nirvana was wonderful. And much of what we were served was excellent. But the seitan didn’t fool me, or at least my teeth.

Candle 79

I was going to spend my entire morning talking about last night’s festivities at the nuyorican, but meg did a better job. Pride doesn’t begin to describe my feelings about how she manhandled the building last night.

kneepits:

as previously mentioned here, after being defeated at the nuyorican last wednesday, i was determined to make it to the second round sometime before departing for new zealand. last night my mother, her boyfriend, oksana, b-nice, my brother and his pal from rehab came down to the lower east side to support me. omni, ben couch, and eden’s roommate rachel were also there to perform.

the sacrificial poet was impressive and he set the bar high for the rest of the poets. the judges scored him well. the first perfect score went to a poet semi-quickly, as the next three poets who followed him did even better, and got perfect scores just the same. the amount of 10s given out was unheard of. i grew weary following all these high scoring poets, and when omni said, semi-sarcastically, “all you need to do is get 30s,” i knew what i had to do.  i receieved words of love and rubs on my back but i shoved them off with hatred. i carved the word “potbelly” into paper with ferocity. i needed to get angry. and i did.

when i got to the mic i remembered everything, from verbal abuse to losing family members. i performed “a memoir in ten parts” (working title: the uncle poem) like i never have before. the crowd response was amazing. even better was seeing three score cards with big, fat, black “10”s on them. a perfect score.

my goal completed: i made it into the second round.

I know I haven’t been in school for a while. But that is the actual cost of a single class at Hunter College. Am I dating myself, here? Is this normal?

I’m writing a letter to my congressman.

And if that fails my new president.

This is bulllllshit.

Head low in grass.

Bottom lip’s spit makes mud of the eaten dirt

Sight snakes through compartments of sky

Cut up by grass blades – moist on foreheads

Fooling strands of hair into calling them cousins

Head low in grass

These eyelids are fighters

Sucker-punch the sunshine

I shimmy.

Belly swerve snake turn

Creep up on a slug

Cry till he’s a dead-man

Head low in grass

A grave contradiction of terms

I am many things

Like each piece of the sky

Fenced in by my living knives

Thatch-crown. Halo of the landscape.

If you’ve mistaken me for a person

I apologize

I am terrible when uncovered

Squirm in my rock-box.

Scream.

From Chapter VIII “Coke, Assholes, & Painkillers”

Our protagonist, Thomas Jones, has just been mugged by school children. He has a broken rib and is awaiting attention at a local hospital.

The last time Thomas was in a hospital, he had just come to the realization that blue pajamas and red tablecloth tied around your neck do not a flying superhero make. As twenty neighborhood kids looked on, Thomas leapt from his roof, hands outstretched in the air, big drooly smile on his big doofy face, and fell quickly and awkwardly on his lawn. Little Thomas Jones had broken his legs.        

That hospital trip was not unlike this one. The waiting room stunk like a funeral and was packed to the bricks with moaning, sweaty, half-dressed invalids – each one either bleeding or wheezing or heaving or crying. Worse than all this was the fact that unlike his last visit the time was on this occasion by now nearly one in the morning. Much like a White Caste, a hospital’s clientele is entirely dependant on the time of day. In the early afternoon, a hospital is populated by bee stings, snakebites, and sprained ankles, not unlike the way a White Castle is rife with little league teams, construction workers, and overweight video game champions. At one AM, however, a White Castle is stuffed with the stoned, the homeless, and those who’s vulva are on sale for not much more than a cheeseburger. Similarly, a hospital in earliest morning smells like a neglected litter box and is home to the diseased, the drugged, and the dying. Its sound, a rush of sobbing, wailing, squelching madness is full and horrible. By day, girl-scouts get stitches. At night, old ladies die slowly.       

Fortunately for anyone not standing on this reaper’s porch, the hospital was also located in Wildwood. This alone would bring in a different sort of midnight injuries. However. the fact that they were not only in Wildwood, but in Wildwood during early August –the  summer’s smoldering centerpiece - was most important. The year’s litter of pissy teenagers from Long Island were always up to the task of providing much-needed comic relief. Like a Falstaffian Messiah, nothing would break up the mouth-filling misery of a hospital waiting room like a 19 year old boy having his stomach pumped because he drank four gallons of milk in fifteen minutes on a dare. Or the girl who waddles into the room at four A.M like she had shit her pants, when she really had a bottle of Zima stuck in her honeypot. Better stil, the brilliant young genius who pierced his own nipple with a nail gun. That last one was especially amusing because he ran through the sliding glass doors in nothing but flip flops and khaki shorts, screaming at the very top of his lungs with an expression of utter horror – absolutely covered in blood.  For about one second you might’ve thought he had been shot. But then you’d realize: Nope. He’s just a fucking moron.       

Thomas spent the next forty-five minutes reading a pamphlet about Prostate Cancer back to front at least thirty times. By the look of the hospital bulletin board, Prostate Cancer Awareness Month was upon them. There were pamphlets and posters of smiling, middle-aged men flashing thumbs-up signs. He couldn’t help but wonder what precisely those men intended to do with those big, floppy, upturned digits. This was the last thing a man who used to give himself breast exams three times a year in complete terror at the prospect of being diagnosed with cancer of the boobs.      

He was horrified by what he read. Apparently, men his age should already be having annual examinations for this most deadly form of cancer. Early detection is key, said the pamphlet. Torn between living and having his rectal cavity probed by a hariy-knuckled proctologist, Thomas considered his options. Should he mention his concern to the doctor? He had certainly had plenty homophobia for one day and was not wont to stink up the thumb of a quarterback. Half-asleep and imagining a conversation in which he would ask another adult to put their hand in his asshole, Thomas was shook awoke by a hammy pink hand on his shoulder. The nurse, a portly little Irish sausage of a woman with big sloppy curls no doubt loosened by the stress of playing catch with the projectile vomit of a heroin addict someone found on the boardwalk, nodded motherly up to a waiting physician who was still calling his name.  

“Thomas Jones”

for your business card.