Hidden treasures discovered while digging through Frank Moore's huge archives.

Tag: Digital paintings (page 1 of 2)

Graduation

For Erika
by Frank Moore, Sunday, September 01, 2002


Really
There is no beginning,
No ending,
No leaving or going,
No stages or signposts
You came with an urge
To expand
Into yourself
Outside of your skin
Into your body
Outside of what is known or comfortable
This terrible urge of yours
Is the same urge
That’s exploding
The whole universe
In all directions
Without itself
You came to dance
With me
Within your dangerous urge,
To battle demons
With me,
To play
And explore pleasure
Freedoms,
And fears
With me…
Always dry wisecracks
And shrugging off
Misgivings
Loudly
Before you leaped
But you leaped
Every time into the expanding
Rings of vulnerable power
Of becoming…
Becoming
The gentle tides
That wash away
The sand fortresses
Of isolation
Which appeared so massive solid,
Just dissolved,
Melted harmlessly.
Yes, you became
The gentle spring rains
Erasing the hard chalk lines
Drawn on playgrounds

By bullies…
“If you step over this, you sissy!”
Now the ghosts and demons
Seem just silly fearful creatures,
Only barely visible
Running away
From your bright, glowing body,
All juicy and relaxed
Yes,
You have expanded,
Are expanding,
Into enjoying life,
Dark and rich
And we,
You and me,
Have expanded lustfully
Deep inside each other,
Body and soul,
Cozy home rooted in love,
Fellow warriors and lovers
Carrying each other
Deep inside
There is no leaving for the likes of us,
Just a never ending graduation
Of us playing together
In the ever pushing urge
to surrender
Into the ever new unknown


“Batman’s Face”, oil on canvas, 40” x 40”, 1976 by Frank Moore

From the book Skin Passion by Frank Moore.

Pleasing

by Frank Moore, Wednesday, June 15, 2005


It is natural
Human
To create happiness
Within our combined body
Living together
Just a part of enjoying
Being together
Infusing
Melting
Surrendering into one another.

This is pleasing,
Caring,
Just being together
In being enough,
Not going anywhere,
No separation,
Floating together
In turn-on,
Doing the dishes together
Cleaning house
Making love
Cooking dinner
Feeding one other
Within our body
Without anything to prove
Or to show…
Just actively following
Together the flowing
Blood within us.
THIS IS PLEASING.

It is fashionable today,
Backed up by correctness,
To refuse to please.
But this “pleasing”
Isn’t our pleasing.
It’s appeasing.
There is nothing within our body
To appease!
The wife appeases
Her abusive husband
To not get clobbered…
The 18 year old girl
Appeases her parents
To win love, approval,
Whatever…
To escape a fist
Of power.
Appeasement
Is coins feeding
The meter
Of isolation
And separation.

“I don’t want to please anymore!”
is bleak,
cutting the heart out,
sealing active surrendering,
melting, infusing
up in a cold cell.
And this is why
Appeasing /
Running away
Is fashionable
Today.

NOT VERY PLEASING…
OR PLEASURABLE!

I ain’t writing
This so-so poem
To please you
Or appease you…
It just came out
Of our body
of loving/enjoying
Being together…
Just like kissing,
Washing dishes…
IF I KISS YOU TO PLEASE YOU
It would separate us,
Would be denying.


“Tracey Is Ready!”, digital painting, 2001 by Frank Moore

From the book Skin Passion by Frank Moore.

The Imagination Woods

For Kirsten
For her birthday
by Frank Moore
, Monday, July 21, 2003


Outside of town,
Behind the field
Where the carnivals
And the traveling preachers
Set up their tents,
There is a woods,
Deep & dark & dense…
Nobody knows how far back it goes.
Everybody knows to keep out of the woods
That always threatens to swallow the town up.
Everybody?
Not quite!
The crazies and the moonshiners ,
The forbidden lovers,
And the lovers of the forbidden,
And wild, untamed children,
All find cover for their sacred crimes
Within the hiding edges
Of the woods.
But not the sane,
The respectable,
The normal…
We never go near the woods,
With its saber-tooth tigers,
Giant leather birds,
Rabid wolves,
Razor grasses,
And the deep hidden pit traps
With generations
Of the bones of corpses.
I’ve heard tales
Children getting sucked
Into the dark heart
Of the cruel woods,
Wandering out years later
Naked, muttering gibberish,
To spend the rest of their days
In THE HOSPITAL OF MERCY.

Me…
I never went near the woods….
Until now…
Until I started talking to Indian Joe.
People say he’s drunk and crazy.
But his breath is sweet;
His words are clear,
Infecting my brain and heart
With longings for new possibilities.
He lives deep in the woods!
He tells me stories of
THE CREATURE KIRSTEN,
The spirit/body dwelling
Within,
Just within!

So here I am,
Walking into the woods,
On a quest for the unlimited unknown.
There’s a ball
Of excited pleasure
In my belly
As I pass through
the community of outcasts,
And leave them behind
On the edge.
I just walk and walk,
Deeper into experience,
Smelling Live and Death
All mixed up.
Everything is melting into everything,
Not staying within skin.
Colors and sounds
Intense, clear,
But blending into me.
My brush presses swirling
Into the fleshy paint pot,
Presses firmly into bright surreal
Colors,
Cool colors on the woods’ floor,
Sunlight vibrates through the leaves,
playing music with the birds & the water.
Is it Kirsten?
Is Kirsten in me?
I’m walking in a joyful creek,
Cool gentle on my feet,
Alive finally!
Enjoying the mud,
The smooth yellow stones
Enjoying walking,
Exploring,
Surrendering,
Merging.
I hear hearty laughing,
From a sexy belly.
Must have been me
Because I don’t see anyone else.
I hear sobbing
Which sinks reality deeper.
I hear “FUCK!”
that explodes into my very being!
Not my voice…
Too much raw emotion.
It’s her!
I keep walking,
Going to the source
Of the creek.
There are balls of mud clay,
Maybe eggs
Each with a unique design.
I keep seeing more of these objects.
Magical?
Ain’t everything in these woods
Magical?
Was Kirsten born from one
Of these mud eggs?
Did a child play-make these mud realities,
Or a primitive?
Questions seems so silly
Within this God!
So do my clothes!
I leave both behind.
Keep walking,
Exploring.
Everything is fusing together.
Every move causes warm pleasure.
I can’t tell what is me anymore.
Don’t need to anymore!
Just keep walking to the source!

I’m now….
Mmmmmm!
I’m indeed now!
But I mean I’m now
At the source of the creek,
A spring of purity.
Outside a crude comfort hut,
A creature stirs a soup pot,
With a keening wail,
She climbs a tree!
With a wild laugh,
She right here with me,
Sharing nude skin pleasure
Rubbing herself into me,
Taking me into her,
Fusing bodies,
Simply enjoying being together,
Being enough!
She keeps changing,
Snorting at the sheer fun
Of our dance/play.
She keeps changing.
An old hag
Croaking sex hexes,
A young girl
Full of wonder,
A lusty sexy seducer,
Now she split into a whole tribe.
We are home
Sitting around the fire
Cooking the soup…
She keeps throwing red hot peppers in
Along with other things she gathered.
I stir the pot as she dances
Beyond time with others in our tribe.
All their voices and bodies are within me.
I’m within their dances
As I stir the pot.
We grow old together
As we wait for the soup
To chill.
We can wait
Because we are in our tribal home
Of being enough.
Then she pours in the moonshine.
This cold hot pepper moonshine soup
Has such a kick!

Damn,
Why didn’t I go into
The woods of imagination
Before?
Well,
I’m here now…
With you!


“Shy”, digital painting, 2010 by Frank Moore

From the book Skin Passion by Frank Moore.

River Vision

by Frank Moore, Sunday, March 21, 1999


People sometimes ask,
“Where is your work heading?
What do you want to do next?”

It is not my work.
It is not my choice.

For me,
it is not a question
of a next thing.
It is a growing,
evolving vision.
I am carried along
in this vision
of life,
of art.
A performance does not have
a beginning
or an end.
It is just
a tiny bit
of the vision.
The vision braids
around itself,
flowing on. I do not know
where the vision
is taking me. I have not been down
this vision before.

One thing’s for sure. We humans
are not the end
of evolution.


“Sunset Rise”, digital painting, 2010 by Frank Moore

THE GHOSTLY FINGERS OF ABSTRACTION

By Frank Moore
Wednesday, June 01, 2005

the ghostly fingers
of abstraction
are cold oatmeal.

those hands
of wind
can not touch
or hold.
they go right thru you…
not very fulfilling
not very satisfying

time to get out of that room,
time to stop waiting

“Flower Power”, digital painting, 2010 by Frank Moore

From the book Skin Passion by Frank Moore.

Falling Into Skin

by Frank Moore, Thursday, January 10, 2002

Lying here together
Just holding each other
Small, warm,
Smelling each other
Breathing each other in
Breathing life in
Breathing everything in
Taking everything into our bodies
Our body
Breathing life,
All life in, deeply
To our core,
Then breathing pleasure out,
All warmed up,
Breathing warm pleasure
In all life everywhere,
Watering life,
Growing stronger, freer
With every deep breath
Taking EVERYTHING in
Transforming transmuting everything
Into our rose-skin reality
Falling falling falling
Masks falling away
Who we pictured ourselves
Falling away
Just surrender into each other,
Into egoless self within us combined,
Without fear
Trusting the core within us
Falling
Skin melting
Nerve-endings pull us in
From within
Rich blood rushes in,
Washing us from within,
Tides within between us
Rocking rubbing on each other
In the sea of skin
Everywhere surrounding us,
Enveloping us
You lay here, me in your mouth
Not going anywhere
Just slight movement
To keep arouse pleasure alive
Beyond time
Before separation,
Before birth and death
A calm excitement
Of being together
Being within,
Not being between

There is a draining,
A releasing of surface tension
Skin pales
As everything flows deeper
To the core
Everything gets slower,
Warm cool
Beats melt together
Warm wax colors flow in veins
We get too small,
We become invisible
Rubbing rocking me
From your belly button
Downward
In between
Moist
Absorbing everything
Into our grooved smallness
Into the life code of change
Where we play
Unseen, unknown
Rocking small, pale
Falling
Without fear
Into the cool tickling grass
Sinking into cool slippery mud
Getting dirty
Falling,
Following the roots
Downward into cracks
In hard cold rocks
Breaking them open
Revealing hidden meanings
Breaking through to underground ocean
Of dark invisible matter,
Warm satin which seeks out
All space,
Seeks out all skin,
Becoming/enfolding our body
Filling everything
So small
That we plunge into the molten core,
Into subatomic center beyond space
Into solar explosion deep
in the universal everywhere
breathing spiraling warm change
in and out deeply
as we lie here
smelling the sweet sweat
of our very human bodies

“Linda and Frank”, digital painting, 2008 by Frank Moore

From the book, Skin Passion: poems and paintings by Frank Moore.

Just Between Us

by Frank Moore, Wednesday, December 12, 2001

We enter the magic cave
Of play and healing,
Shedding our fiction characters
We use outside,
Ego masks, skin tight,
Limiting….limiting the expanding.
Those masks will change
When we put them back on,
Softening to fit our new bodies, new faces…
Later.

Here we are
More than ourselves
More of ourself
Expanding
Expanding into one another
Rubbing skin
Friction of pleasure
Falling into the in-between
Surrender to the falling
Out of time and space,
Surrendering into discomfort
Of strangeness which contains
A strange comfort of remembering
The body and soul

Falling into the in-between,
Surrendering into the trance
Pleasure friction of creation
Rubbing dead skin into each other,
Aroused and excited,
Going into each other,
Taking each other in,
There is no THE OTHER,
No IN-BETWEEN.
Breathing each other deeply,
Smelling and tasting,
Licking and kissing,
Prickly state of inter-penetration,
Nerves connected
In the skin,
Melt bodies together,
Removes the lies of separation,
Hearts beat together strong relax,
Rich red blood flows deep.

We rock calm deep contained within each other
Within the combined body
Deep pleasure flows over us
Washing from deep within.

We have been here before,
Being contained within everything,
Enveloping everything within.
Lying extended within our combined body,
Combined self/soul,
relaxed, enjoying being within,
Sucking aroused pleasure up
As a tide of change,
Enjoying being with each other
Without going anywhere,
Being enough.

The tide,
the laugh
Giggle, sobbing
Pleasure
Leave our body reality
Trance of inter-dependence,
Inter-penetration,
Holy healing play dance,
And flows inward into the whole cosmos,
Changing everything,
Changing healing unseen, unknown

We leave the cave
With each other inside…
And our masks expand and soften.


“Kittee”, digital painting, 1999 by Frank Moore

CREATIVITY IS LIKE SHITTING

By Frank Moore, May 31, 2005

Creativity is like shitting.
Most people do it.
Everyone needs to do it….
More or less regularly.
Every shit is different.
There is nothing like a good shit!
Some people obsess on their shitting!
Some obsess on their own shit;
Others obsess on others’ shit,
Even buying it!
I just enjoy a good shit!
Oh shit,
I’ll let you in on a secret…
I play with shit!
Creativity is just playing.


“Toni”, by Frank Moore, digital painting, 2011

Season of hidden hope

a radio musical

November 23, 1993

1

Walking along
cold dark homeless
roads
clogged with ice fears,
my only friend
is the wind
chilling my bones
into longing
and lost
and beyond…
into a cynical loneliness.

Herding my sheep,
looking in windows
of unattainable desires,
looking at presents
useless
because
I don’t have anyone to give them to,

looking into the past
soft colored warm homes
that are no longer mine.

Everyone has left,
everyone is gone.

Even the sun has left
long ago,
long before the manger.

And the sun
will not come back
ever
again.
This is the season
of dark depression
and fragile suicide.

Yes,
I know
I can always bum up
the $29.95
to buy
the plastic hope and faith
at 7 Eleven
and pretend
it is my wonderful life
playing
in the video store’s window.

But instead
I wrap myself
in a jaded pretense
of dry ice isolation
of not caring,
and drinking
the stale
but warm wine of regrets.


2

The birth
of new hope
has always been hidden within
the long cold
winter darkness.

Huddled together,
clinging to our tribal warmth
as our only protection
against dying
into the scary
black
unknown,

we always have been blind
to the evergreen
hope of life.

It has always been
the first time
the sun
and easy hope
have gone away.

So we always think
they will never
come again.

The evergreen hope
has been hidden
away
in the womb
of the humble
and in children’s dreams.

The forces of greys
have always overheard
the possibility
of the hidden hope…
have always searched
for it
to pervert it
into human isolation…
or,
failing that,
to kill it
for all time.

But the forces of power
always overlook
the hidden human hope
rocking
in the baby’s cradle.

As power
goes on a desperate killing,
chopping
hacking
gorging,
eating
the old world up……
we huddle together
in the silent night
upon the hill,
rocking together
in our tribal body warmth.

The shaman,
the holy woman,
the medicine man
have always shifted
our attention away
from the dark
cold
outward
fear,
have always shifted
our gaze
to the guiding light
of new birth…
at first
in the stars,
then in the roaring
tribal fire
which pulled
all human feelings
within it,
and still later
into that corny
home hearth
crackling
with bright colors
popping.

Into this fire
we have always gone,
hearing
the drumming
of our innocent heart
beating
in a slow excitement,
meeting
again
our love of life.
We curl up
with our love
and wait
for warm spring
to arrive…
as hope grows
into knowing.


Christmas Card, digital painting, 2008 by Frank Moore
Christmas Card, digital painting, 2011 by Frank Moore
















Art of Reshaping Reality

Abstract by Frank Moore, 1996

by Frank Moore
March 24, 1999

There are all kinds of art.
There is art that calms,
art that pacifies,
art that sells,
art that decorates,
art that entertains.

But what I am
committed to is
art as a battle,
an underground war
against fragmentation.
The battle is on all realities.

The controllers
have always tried
to fragment us.
Fragment us
from each other.
Imprison us
in islands of sex,
color,
religion,
politics,
classes,
labels,
etc.,
etc.,
etc.,
etc.,
etc.
they fragment
our inner worlds,
they blow
our individual realities apart,
and play the pieces
against one another.
They are us,
or a part of us.
They are the controllers,
the politicians,
the sexists,
the women’s libbers,
the pornographers,
the censors,
the moralists,
the church,
the media,
the businessmen,
educators,
the victims
and the powerful.

They are us.
They have divided us
from our power,
from our beauty,
from our lust for life
and pleasure.
They have divided us
from most of reality –
divided dying from living –
sex from living,
sex from pleasure.
We are kept in
boxes of fear,
of mistrust.
We are kept waiting –
kept waiting
to do what
we want –
waiting
for enough money,
enough schooling,
for everything to be right.
We are kept waiting
and protecting
and hiding
and suffering.

This is the time
to do battle
with the boxes.

As artists,
our tools
are magic,
our bodies,
taboos,
and dreams.

This kind of art
can be bubbles of childhood –
hidden places
where you can play and explore –
it is the kids’ under-the-covers world,
the playhouse,
the treehouse,
the cave,
behind the barn,
playing doctor,
cars at drive-ins
before going all the way,
Huck Finn’s raft,
tepees.
People are afraid
of this area of
lusty exploring
that they think
they have out-grown
— but they are sucked into it.

But this kind of art
can have a more
heavy-duty
magical side to it
that shocks,
offends,
and breaks new ground.
This side is what is locked in,
the subconscious,
the womb,
the underground,
hell/heaven,
pleasure/torture,
the coffin,
the grave,
birth/death/rebirth,
dream/nightmare,
the hidden world
of taboos.

Artists of this breed
need to be
warriors who are willing
to go into the areas of taboo,
willing to push
beyond where
it is comfortable
and safe
to explore
and build
a larger zone
of safeness.
They need to be
idealists,
willing to live ideals.