re: week 10 of video poems.

hello friends, fans, foe and lovers,

here is another video poem from my new book "A moon made of copper." it's called "the stars," and is on page 56, check it out and feel free to share.

until next time,

cheers,

cb.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XwESOBDA4Y&index=1&list=PLrLZoyxEG0csuYFVXscOZ8mtjpQyKsjYy

re: post-colonial setting.

hello friends, fans, foe and lovers,

it is week 9 of my video series promoting "A moon made of copper," and i have a book launch in my home town of Kamloops, BC.

i think hometown gigs are the toughest, because everyone is used to you and your schtick and i think take it for granted in some ways. "oh he's here, he'll be here next week," and so on. i did that once, when i was living in Austin, Texas and seeing Stevie Ray Vaughn. i was in Austin for just over a year and caught SRV in a show, but way too briefly and then he was gone. that haunts me to this day.

plus, people always want things for free at hometown gigs, hahaha, of which, i have nothing, because i can barely afford to pay attention these days. haha.

anyway, here's a no-frills video for this week, I've got to go put up posters for the reading and get some media love, which means this no make up video. hahahaha. kidding.

it's for the poem "post-colonial setting," on page 73 of my new book "A moon made of copper."

enjoy!

cheers,

chris bose.

click link here to video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfx8gtIHmmQ&list=PLrLZoyxEG0csuYFVXscOZ8mtjpQyKsjYy&index=1

and a link to buy the book here 

if you are so inclined:

http://kegedonce.com/bookstore/item/57-a-moon-made-of-copper.html

cover art by Bracken Hanuse Corlett

re: new video poem

hello friends, fans, foe and lovers,

here's my 8th video poem for my new book "A moon made of copper."

it's called "Snow and Slush," and is on page 92.

click on the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQZoYZvY4Dw&feature=youtu.be

published by Kegedonce Press

edited by Joanne Arnott

cover art by Bracken Hanuse Corlett

(thanks man!)

re: luck, a new video poem

hello friends, fans, foe and lovers,

here's a new video poem for my new book, "A moon made of copper." it's called "Luck," and on page 72.

happy holidays,

cb

and a link to this video on my youtube channel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XaZ3rWLZVL4&feature=youtu.be

re: new video poem!!

hello friends, fans, foe and lovers,

i miss you, it's been too long already, even though it's been only a few days.....here's my new video poem for my new book "A moon made of copper," published by Kegedonce Press a couple months ago. It's on page 62, and it's called "Wake up."

Do watch the video and read the poem. I'm doing pretty much what i wanted with my life, but like anything, it comes with a price, but i'm fine with that and i no longer pine for the past like i once did. life is good my friends, live it well because we never know how long we've got. i vaguely remember writing this poem, it was about 4 years ago, and the video represents what my life has been like since my last book was published and some success with my art and stuff. my wish now is life to get crazier and to tour overseas with other secret projects i've got in the works.

i hope the best for you over the holidays with your friends, family and loved ones, i'll be working diligently on new stuff and will let you know more as i know more about it. haha.

until next time lovers,


chris bose. aka horatio cornblower.

re: new video poem

hello friends, fans, foe and lovers,

here's my new video poem for my new book, "A moon made of copper," entitled "watching you," which is about parenting and missing your children when out on the road working, being away from home, trying to make a living and so on. as well as being creative if you're an artist, musician, poetry, filmmaking and so on......

balancing family and work is never easy, add creativity and the need to appease the muse, then it's almost impossible to do. i'm away at least a couple months a year on the road, and i miss my kids every single day, but this is down from up to six months a year. you go away, do your thing, work, try to make some money, and come back, buildings have gone up, or been torn down, people become parents, people die, get sick and seasons pass. it's a weird life.

anyway, this video is for parents who work at being creative and being parents simultaneously, i recorded this song with my kids playing in the background and is probably the only demo song to ever start off with "Hey! Feet out of the face!" hahaha

until next time,

cb

re: song 4

hello friends, family, foe and lovers,

here's my video for day 4 of the 5 day song challenge!

it's basically a road video, touring away from home and family, trying to make a buck and being creative at the same time ain't easy and requires a tremendous amount of time on the road. which i love, because you see the most amazing things, meet all kinds of people, live and have crazy stories and learn from it all. hopefully. haha. anyway, check it out!

cheers,


cb

re: all i know is this.....

hello friends, fiends, fans, foe and lovers,

here's my new video poem called, "All I know is this...." and it's from my new book, "A moon made of copper," published by Kegedonce Press.

it was filmed last year in spences bridge, bc, lytton, bc, botanie valley and stein valley bc.

this part of my new challenge, goal of making a film a week and uploading online here and various other social network platforms.

i recently lost my youngest brother to cancer, the day after he died i quit drinking and made a commitment to improve my own health. part of that commitment is getting back into a creative frame of mind and continue pushing boundaries and to challenge myself. over the years i've gotten jaded as fuck, kind of tired and miserable. i felt trapped once again. but these days, i'm feeling good, and moving beyond feeling trapped to, "how do i escape?" haha.

i want to go to europe and play shows, have exhibitions, do readings, go to music festivals and perform in front of tens of thousands of people. how does one get there? lots of hard work. i lost sight of this trapped in my own prison, in my own mind. but i'm ready now to giver and take no prisoners. life is short. live it hard and live it good, who knows what happens afterwards?

until next time lovers,


chris bose.

re: a moon moon made of copper

Hello lovers, fans, friends and foe,

how's it going? here's a new video offering, a video poem for my new book called, "A moon made of copper," featuring music by yours truly and my old pal Sean Luciw. We recorded this in about 2003, but i think i wrote it back in the 1990's.

making some good changes in my life, and will be continuing to upload new things as times go on and i get on with it.

cheers,


cb

re: my writing process, sort of a response to joanne arnott's blog!

hello friends, fans, foe and lovers,

back again, it's been awhile, i lose my way on the internet quite often as well as damn passwords. haha. with so many websites and stuff to take care of, passwords get mixed up and forgotten. i hope all is well wherever you are, and this blog is about a project joanne arnott started, she's been the editor for my last two books of poetry, "Stone the Crow," and my newest one, "A Moon Made of Copper," which comes out July 15 nationwide through Kegedonce Press.

without further ado, let's begin with some questions:

What am i working on?

Well, i just finished working on my latest book of poetry and non-fiction called, "A Moon Made of Copper," with Joanne Arnott. It's all new work, written in the past 4 years since my last book, "Stone the Crow," which seems like an impossibly long time. I don't write all the time, or very often in fact due to the reasons of being a workshop facilitator, artist, dad, filmmaker, musician and so on. i'm spread a little thin i guess, but i do believe this is my strongest work i've written. focussing is a challenge, haha, but i'm going to probably start writing more, it's just discipline. i used to get up every morning and write for about 3 or 4 hours every single day, and then spend the afternoon sort of editing what i'd written.

but to be an "artist," for a living, means diversification. you have to be able to do a bit of everything to make a buck, workshops in filmmaking, photography, mural painting, street art, even music and songwriting along with creative writing. if you were to do only one discipline, you would not be able to survive. so i'm busy doing a bunch of other things and i think i'm going to slow down and write some grants to do research and development into creating a new body of work artistically and creative writing as well. i also am the creative director for the arbour collective, a group nacoma george and i started back in 2011, so we do community  based arts projects throughout the kamloops area and that's nearly a full time gig on top of everything else. it's a bit hectic, but we're representing aboriginal artists, filmmakers, writers and musicians here in the kamloops area and beyond. we had about 7 exhibitions in 4 different cities, as well as a 10 artist residency last year, which was insane. we're slowing down a little this year. haha. just a bit.

how does my work differ from others of its genre?

that's a good question. i think there's this "sacredness," aboriginal authors tenderly tip toe around, many do not tread on the "black road,"which to me is the path that is infinitely wide and often without direction. in the writing of many other aboriginal authors, their writing, reflects the "red road," or the higher ground and "sacred," or holistic way of living. i choose to go to the darker places, sometimes lonelier, sometimes intoxicating, sometimes crazy places to live and be instead of the red road. this reflects the life i've known growing up, both my parents went to residential school, and both were basically put through the meat grinder. they've made their choices to deal with what they went through and more often than not, it meant getting numb by any means necessary. usually alcohol. so i guess i'm saying i'm not afraid to be "real," and write about what i know, how i live, or what i've done on the black road. it's not for everyone, but if you're a fan of leonard cohen or charles bukowksi or the beats, allen ginsberg, jack kerouac, and william s. burroughs, then you'll likely dig my new book, "A Moon Made of Copper."

why do i write what i do?

this is an easy question, because i write what i know about or experience. i'm not a "fiction," writer, because life is crazy enough i don't have to make things up. haha. growing up aboriginal in canada isn't the most easy experience. there's violence, abuse, racism, but also family, ceremonies, songs, stories and incredible amounts of laughter and good times. everyone has a story, it's just finding out a way to tell it. i guess i've also lead a pretty crazy life, done an incredible amount of traveling and performing for most of my life, so telling these stories is a way to remember things.

how does my writing process work?

a long time ago, i used to do everything longhand, then computers came along and i remember bashing away on a monochrome monitor computer, using dos, and some really primitive word processing project. that must be over 20 years ago. wow. haha. i use a computer almost always, unless i'm not near one, then i'll write it out by hand. i used to self-publish a lot, i think i did about 4 books back in the 1990's, as well book my own reading tours and get them into stores on consignment deals or outright selling them. i toured most of b.c. and sold about 500 books or more. i used to do all sorts of things for promotional give aways, bookmarks, post cards, posters, and so on. i think it's because i come from a musical background, having to do our own tours, posters, shirts and so on, i applied the same skills to poetry and creative writing. haha.

i think i process things for a long time before i start writing about them. i usually get an idea for a poem while traveling, mountain biking or doing an art project. something gets triggered and if i don't jot it down right away it gets lost. i don't do a lot of navel gazing, because i don't have time, haha, so when i get an idea i have to act on it. i think i've got a new direction to go in soon, would like to do some non-fiction. about 10 years ago, i wrote 3 books back to back, the first one i've been re-editing so maybe i'll try to get it out next year. time to get back to writing every day. maybe here on the blog. i don't know. we'll have to see.

also, never underestimate the support of a mentor. i was lucky enough to have Garry Gottfriedson mentor me when i really started to get serious about creative writing, some 20 years ago! as well, about 10 years ago Richard Van Camp mentored me as well to the next level. these friendships came about because of my stubborn persistence to get published. haha. i passed along my poetry to both of those authors and they contacted me or i contacted them and they helped me out by getting my work stronger creatively and to continue working to find my "voice." also, this is a long road, i've been writing over 20 years. i got published in about 20 literary magazines before i got my first book deal. it's a tough slog, but it's worth it. even though my subject matter is dark, i break it up really well during readings with humour and observations. again, my history as a musician has probably really helped me be comfortable on a stage in front of lots of people. never underestimate your strengths.

the cover art for my next book

by Bracken Hanuse Corlett.

well, that's about it. i'll get back on here more often now that i remembered my password!!! haha!

thanks to Joanne Arnott for editing my book "A Moon Made of Copper," coming out July 15 through Kegedonce Press. Thanks to everyone at Kegedonce press, Kateri Akiwenzie Damm, Renee Abram and Allison Brown. Thanks to Bracken Hanuse Corlett and Amanda Strong for the awesome cover art.