Welcome to my Experimental Website!

My name is Jackson and I would like to present to you the work my fellow classmates and I have produced this quarter. This is our fourth and final unit as juniors here at Freestyle Academy. We were given the task of elaborating further on a theme we had studied or taken interest in earlier in the year, and create a website, multitude of poems relevant to our topic, a song using either ProTools or Reason 5, an animation with spoken audio of one of our Enligh poems, and an experimental art piece using the medium and elements of our choice.

Within this site you will discover a multitude of poems I created relevant to the theme of mental isolation and anguish. I find the workings of the human psyche utterly fascinating, and the way it responds to traumatic events or experiences. Some of my poems are the direct product of a very painful breakup, while others just cover the vast expanse of my thoughts. My animation is a frame-by-frame that connects to one of my favorite poems. And my experimental art piece from design utilizes the techniques of a famous pop artist, Roy Lichtenstein, by transforming an image of a particular facial expression and cartoonizing it, while maintaining the embodiment of that certain emotion. Lastly my music piece, produced in reason, is a Drum and Bass track. Seeing as the definition of experimental art it quite nearly, "explore and get weird with it," I wanted to learn more about my favorite kind of music. So, following an online tutorial, I spent dozens of hours sampling different drum loops, EQing my tracks, and attempting to put together a fast-paced electronic song.

The tools I used for this project were the digital tools of Reason 5, Adobe Photoshop CS5, Illustrator, and Flash.

Freestyle has taught me thousands of lessons in relation to technology, multimedia communication, and myself as a person these past few months. As a program it is the quintessential catalyst for propelling oneself successfuly into today's competitive modern job market. The skills aquired here and friendships instigated and solidified are priceless things that will undoubtedly mold me into a better and more rounded person in life. I would like to dedicate a very personal thank you to Mr. Florendo, Mr. Greco, and Ms. Parkinson for their unwavering patience and commitment to each and every student this year.

You can return to my Project Listing Page here >

Animated Poem

This is my animated poem. I selected one of my static poems from English and transformed the idea contained in the writing into a moving animation in web using Flash.

I did my best to capture the mood and atmosphere of my poem and translate those elements into visual and audio components. I took my ideas and transposed them animately and visually so they story could literally come to life.

My music

I created a Drum n' Bass audio track using Reason 5. Drum and bass, explained in the link, is a furious tempo style of electronic music. It utilizes a kick and snare drum, usually set at around 170 BPM or, beats per minute. Often these two interrelated aspects are accompanied by a leading synth and background bass of varying type. I followed a simple online tutorial and put in dozens of hours to produce this song, as it is the first time I have ever attempted to create a full length DnB track, or Reason song in general. Reason is a massive and phenomenal digital tool using literally millions of samples from organic instruments to allow the user to have a near infinite database of music at their fingertips. It may seem daunting, but mastery of Reason's finer aspects allow one to create groundbreaking things. Enjoy.

 

 

Here is a screenshot of my Reason file for the song above. This was taken long before the song was completed, and you can see the loops in the bottom window, and the different sample and distortion tools in the upper window. Reason is an extensive program of which I have barely begun to scratch the surface.

Poetry

When it was announced we were initiating a poetry unit in English, I was one of the many voices who uttered a disheartened grumble of dissatisfaction. A week later I was churning out rhymes both for school and on my free time. I found a new outlet for my moods, utilizing the strategy called, "Stream of Conciousness," I wrote poems beginning to end without stopping to think or make grammatical edits. I found that pouring the raw and unfiltered emotion and thought of the moment at hand into my work produced the most beautiful and artistic results. A break-up with my girlfriend just a week after we started the unit was the emotional catalyst to a flurry of production. Now I have over twenty pages of rhymes, mostly written in something called "free verse" where I have total freedom over the structure and rhyme scheme of the poem. A less-know rapper, Grieves (pictured to the left), inspired a lot of my work. His songs never stray from the path of exposing the cold truth in life, in my time of emotional turmoil I found his complex, yet simplistic rhymes about the struggles of everyday life something to aspire to. His humble approach to conveying the struggle we all must face makes him a true poet in my eyes, he doesn't rap for the money or fame or girls, he raps so people understand him. And we live in a harsh world, where people gather around that flame in the cold, a beacon drawing the disadvantaged so they can relate and share their stories.

Haiku
The black shrouded man
Walked across the dry hard-pan
A shadow of death

Who are We?
I am the speaker who is not he, because I am the speaker, I am me
I am the harbinger, the crow of despair
That makes your skin stand on end, every pore, every hair
My cold, odious feel reminds many of that of an eel
I slither my way right into your mind, and slowly sanity begins to unwind
Am I you or me, and me is who we? Are you confused yet? So are the other twenty three
Am I embedded deep in your brain? My primary goal is to become deeply engrained
In the recess of thought, to wreak utter distress, and then you'll be off three for the less
Are her or a him? What on a whim, would you like to know about me or about you, or what separates us, us two
Really I say, you're very quite mad, your memory seems to be ailing quite bad
If you recall it is not I who is you, but you who is me, and we are a split personality of three
We could share the brains of a tree, or monkey or ox, or even a very well-dressed fox
But, with great pleasure I say, that it is no creature that dines upon hay
We are one, one and the same, and in that we are different, you see now so let the darkness lead the way

Narrative (Grieves)
A grisly mind
Not that
Of a bear
But the concious of a killer
Cold as stone
He stalks his prey
Not beast or game
But real life man
The angel of vengeance
For sins unsung
Preying on the unassuming devils
Who in the crowd to walk
Marked by no blemish or stature
Only by their deeds
He seeks them with ruthless abandon
And avenges the wronged
The punishment shall fit the crime
Each, each and every time
He is known only as Grieves
A fearsome shadow
Flitting in the dark
Young, white and skinny
He wears tight fitting jeans and a hoodie
Always in black
Always in black
Like a shadow, a wraith of despair
He is adorned
By jet black hair
Straight and sharp it falls into his eyes
Which take the lives of those who lie
A single piercing, upon his lip
Distinctly mark his true character
A stomped in rib,
Or mangled throat
His punk rock converse are coated with the blood of many
But unbeknownst to all but him
There is one final sin
One final killer on the loose
Who he must bring to justice
So scaling that tall, tall building with care
He took one last time to brush his hair
From his eyes without a tear
And the story ends right
Here

Sunny Side Up (Consistent Meter)
Yesterday my life was filled with rain
So please, ease the pain
My heart so cold
You with your action so bold
This is a broken place

Yesterday my life was filled with rain
So please, ease the pain
Another entered the scope
Never again turn to dope
Write on the mirror with a razor blade
Slowly, these thoughts will fade

Yesterday my life was filled with rain
So please, ease the pain
The devil in my head
Whispers like the voices of the dead
A heart, chiseled from stone
Never again will I feel so alone

Yesterday my life was filled with rain
So please, ease the pain
The raindrops, pouring down
Sizzling on my tear-stained cheeks and onto the ground
Falling to the distant earth
While you walk away, eyes full of mirth

Yesterday my life was filled with rain
So please, ease the pain
Ease the hurt etched in stone
Among darkness, roses bloom alone

Today my life is filled with rain
I cannot stop the pain

The Real (A Metaphor)
Tree trunks for feet
Though lacking hooves essence does bleat
And scream like bloody poetry
The agony inside the key
Set this anguished soul free
Look up the figure, recoil in fear
Where should be stomach, it is clear
That the flesh that should be here
Has been replaced with hide of deer
And to your dismay
His ribcage has begun to decay
To twist and morph into a tangle of wire
His eyes burn with crimson fire
Not man, not beast this creature walks
And barely opening his mouth when he talks
He utters whispers, oft unheard
As if speaking to the passing bird
A wretched thing, a foul creation
Of your overactive
Imagination

Despicable
I bleed my thoughts from my head
Spilled like bloody guts from this pen
Searching for a savior, not knowing when
Or how or when or why or why
Only that it is blood, not tears I cry
Searching, hands raised to the sky
I scream, why oh why
These brutal thoughts and angry notions
Never put my plan to motion
Always back, never here
Moving forward, nowhere near
Scream my throat red raw with pain
But never brings any gain
Impressing sorrows to my peers
Assuage the pain, stop my tears
Turned to ice inside my heart
My soul and mind once depart
Thrice unto their solid will
End this all with a bright red pill
Tumble to that stormy abyss
In the chaos find your bliss
Revel in the newfound love
Of loving nothing, like life with a glove
Buried deep above the ground
While outside the storm does pound
And rattle and shake and whine and moan
And batter the shingles of this sideways home

 

Death in the Graveyard
Take your sleep in the bed of black roses
The dream is real
The darkness the light
So stretch your shaking fingertips forward
Emancipate the demons of your heart
Lay your skeletons to bed
Tuck them in
And kiss them goodnight
Escape the torment
Flee,
Flee these hallowed grounds
Climb that rusted gate
They pursue you
Don't stop, don't look back
The nightmare is your reality so don't stumble
The last train leaving the station
Don't miss it or face eternal damnation
They want to bring out the demons inside
You cannot run
You cannot hide
One fish, two fish, red fish, blue
Run away
They're coming for you

Endless
The stone cold tears, littered here
This shore so empty
The pen lies dead upon the table
Murdered by the reality of fable
But you cannot escape,
Not from this stable
This prison of mind
For what you will find
Are peculiar things
Long hidden away
Brought to the surface
To remind you their permanance will stay
Upturn your vivid lips
Show your teeth and smile
Embrace the blade as it kisses you
Put those scissors in your gums
Sing out loud and don't be scared
This pain is only a figment of your fear
It isn't real, it isn't here
This comfortable release
Will help to piece
Back together both the crooked heart and broken home
Try to swim upstream without a paddle
This is foolish, you won't win this battle
Fall into an upside down grave
Be brave
Never become a mental slave
Let that shovel spell out the future
As it writes out the deathly letters upon the past
Defining your future
Eternalize the pain in joy and swallow it whole
Carve that misery into a rainbow
Use that razor wit, sharp as blade
As it eviscerates flesh
Tearing mind from matter in the present
Because we live in the past
Fear the future
And know we won't last
So embrace the symphony as it calls from behind
And direct your efforts sideways and narrow as your options multiply
Swallow the shoes
As they walk away in toes
Bury them deep down inside
Even seven feet wide
The rushing hours of the day
Sprint past, never seem to stay
The voices, always in your ear
"Do it, you're not wanted here"
But "no!" you say
I am here to stay
This train has long since jumped track
My mind is on the loose
And never coming back

 

Young
Words
Babbled like the gurgling water of a stream
Tumbling over one another

They spilled forth like the blood from a particularly fatal wound
Engulfing the senses in horror
They were

"I don't think this is working"
"I think he can offer me more"
"I'm sorry"

They stung
Like hell they stung
He couldn't even more, or stutter a reply

Just like that, she was gone
Fleeing without a backwards glance
Off to another, somebody better

He sat there, unable to function
Senses choking everything
The emotions clutching him he could not begin to describe

Sitting on that train-covered rug
Surrounded by books
Life went on in the kindergarten classroom as usual

She played happily with her new truck

Blood Poetry (Inspired by Grieves of RhymeSayers)
The gunshots rang out without end
You could hear them down the road and down the bend
Against their cruel kiss you could not defend
To the eternal sleep, their bite does lend
The nation we know is dead
Killed by greed, sent right to bed
Without a kiss goodnight, we have bade farewell to the light
Death is clutching hands in the day and night
Skipping along with girls in new summer blouses
The melancholy city, mired in severed spouses
Left broken by the cruel reality of their gravity
Lifting them higher, driving to fuel the apathy that claimed their heart
The shouts of children mingle with the cries of the dying, outwitted by the smart
The creative, the poets
Those who know it
How to harness their mind
Walk around a mental city, without feeling blind
Spared by their ability to create from naught
But inside, turmoil makes them distraught
Feeding the flames of hate
And to reciprocate
Their customers gift them with the blossom of life
Is arming this literary conflict worth the strife

Ice Cream Bonanza
The jingling bells,
Of the ice cream truck!
You can get a Spiderman pop for a buck!
Grab the keys to the car and off we go
Lets get some cold goodies, drive fast, not slow
Straight through the fence
Flattening it with care
Watch out, we're going so fast you might need to hold onto your hair!
Grab a brick, or maybe two
Well shift these children, and make them see blue
Bash them and smash them with flying bricks
They are no match with their puny sticks
Laughing like demons we speed towards the prize
Thinking of icecream, and not our demise
Finally we arrive, famished and hot
We each rob the truck and steal a lot
Then satisfied with our plunder, we swoop his ballons
And strike him down with thunder

 

Neverending
People never change, they're really quite stagnant you'll find
Just get past those impassable barriers of the mind
Scale your hurtles, climb those blocks
See the truth in droves and flocks
The pain washed out to sea
Lost by you, clung onto by me
A wooden spar among despair
Clinging to it like head to hair
The sole survivor of some far-out wreck, bright with life
But slowly, slowly fading inside with strife
The empty promises and hollow words
Not so true, just ask the birds
Or bees or fish or ants or snakes
And become emancipated for your own sake

 

Despicable
I bleed my thoughts from my head
Spilled like bloody guts from this pen
Searching for a savior, not knowing when
Or how or when or why or why
Only that it is blood, not tears I cry
Searching, hands raised to the sky
I scream, why oh why
These brutal thoughts and angry notions
Never put my plan to motion
Always back, never here
Moving forward, nowhere near
Scream my throat red raw with pain
But never brings any gain
Impressing sorrows to my peers
Assuage the pain, stop my tears
Turned to ice inside my heart
My soul and mind once depart
Thrice unto their solid will
End this all with a bright red pill
Tumble to that stormy abyss
In the chaos find your bliss
Revel in the newfound love
Of loving nothing, like life with a glove
Buried deep above the ground
While outside the storm does pound
And rattle and shake and whine and moan
And batter the shingles of this sideways home

 

Piano Keys
Stumbling over these broken keys
Playing a bleeding solo
While counting off by threes
A twisted stanza, no rhyme or reason
To break this pattern, would be outright treason
Stumble down this path
Trying not to fall
Watching my daydreams die
As I grow so tall
Sprouting from the earth as my innocence is lost
A diminishing chain of value, for a double cost
The innuendo sick inside,
Diseased and hurting, vomit splattered ride
Like a roller-coaster sweeping in the tide
So ring that riff, and play it out
Pour your heart and soul into this bout
Fight the tears, live the song
For you have to be short, three minutes long
Combat the maze, struggle through
The crows stare down as you start to blue
The forest leering in
Leeching from your heart, leaving only sin
A trickle of blood, descends from your eye
And iron-hearted, you refuse to cry
A thorn in your being, not visible to see
All I want is for somebody out there, somebody to hear me

 

Nameless
Who are you
You are who and who is who
You is who is who are you?
Through and through
No longer do I know what's true
Only that I am not you
Nor I, nor her, nor him, nor me
Or any of a group of three
So hear my plea
My mind is gone
I am vulnerable as a newborn fawn
I am a mere pawn
Of my own head
Though in here I feel quite dead
Unable to eat, not even bread
I feel misled
I cannot run from myself
Seeing as my head is a shelf
Resting upon my heavy shoulders
Weighed down by imaginary boulders
All my problems bearing down
Smashing me into the ground
Crushing my little spirit, tired will
No longer is the pain a thrill
So please, if you have seen the flyers
My mind is missing, it ran away on tires
I offer but a small reward
If you can return my sanity and I can leave this ward
I hate this cold, acidic rain
Yes, I feel real pain

 

Kings
The messiah, the savior, the voice of heaven
Close your eyes, count to seven
Six more forwards, two back you have eleven
A shadow
Walking the valley of despair
Cloaked in pain, tips of toes to his hair
Awakened, arisen from his divine lair
Suffering from the mental wear and tear
Carving initials into the mirror
Eyes so bloodshot one can barely peer
Into their murky depth, shedding no tear
The self-inflicted anxiety, bubbling bones
Decompressed and crushed his being, like a broken home
But he is not alone

 

Laughter
Soft bells, twinkling their dull happiness
Filling the room with warm sound
The piano keys
Wavered over in the background
It's just quiet now
Quiet
So very quiet
It's almost easy to forget,
All the problems
Swept under the rug
The candles on the table
Burn their message with patient persistence
Walking wily on the wandering wings of a dream
Fallen under the soles of untied shoes
Swirling like silk into the smiling atmosphere
This compromised content
Melting like the waning wax
Dripping, oozing odiously onto the hard wood
Slithering like sick sorrowful snakes
Hissing as they descend, dwindling the former
So see me coming
Winding, wandering that wobbling street

 

You're an Adventure!
You're on an adventure!
I'm sure you're indentured
I'm sure you've endeavored,
And sallied, and skipped and swung and sung,
Fallen and stumbled down every last rung
Tumbled and bumbled your way down into despair
Then picked yourself up, you don't belong there!
To you I shall say without pause or delay,
That life is confusing, more every day
But the more you stay down
I tell you my friend, the more you will frown
And who really wants THAT around?
No! Be joyful and gleeful and happy and fun!
You don't need to stop, you'll know when you've won
Besides, I have a small secret for you my friend,
Don't fret your head gray oer what lies at the end
Think about now!
It's a beautiful place!
Come now, let's see a smile on that dimpled-down face
The journey at hand
Is really quite grand
So get off your bottom,
I know you can stand!
There's folks to be met! Fun to be had! I tell you it's true
So many possibilities, waiting, waiting for you
And I tell you this, without any ado
Whoever is reading this I sincerely hope that someday,
I get to meet you!
So go forth and wander, shine and create!
Fufill that unwritten chapter of fate
And along the way, why not discover your long-lost (half-removed) soul mate!
You can do anything, go on a date
Make it be grand, show them around
And when it is over, don't you fall down
Simply give 'em a smile and be on your way
You've got thousands left, it's only one day.

Happy travels to all, may you wander with purpose.

 

No Title
Just as it got better I found myself wishin'
Fell off that mountain into a prison
Trapped deep inside this marble cataclysm
Now I'm the ground dazed and dizzy
My mind on the run, hive of bees feel so busy
I wish I wish with all my heart it would miss me
But I never intended to feel this free
Never expected such a view, it's a real sight to see
Heavy legs up those stairs never allowing me to fall
I outstretch my fingertips, but always seem too small
Find my limitation, discover my fault
Lock my secrets deep inside this vault
Toss aside the key swear not a soul will reach inside of me
Tear my heart out, bleed away the pain
Scratch my head and feel a tickle in my brain
Not insane, just an itch
My eyes a nervous twitch
Feel the steel on my arm never need a stitch
Hide away the hurt though the evidence is there
Never seen my pain like Harry Potter hide the scar behind my hair
Every wound every tear, bring my hurt to bear
Fall back to my lair, curl up inside my mind
Never moving forward, always left behind
Such is the nature of a dying breed a kind,
A broken human being, left behind to die
Trampled under wheels of fate
Trapped behind a screen too late
Pouring crooked depths of soul
Upon the paper, fill this hole
Pour the mortar, fill those cracks
Mend an army of broken backs
And shattered spines, please hold up mine
I do my best to never whine
To never show my pain or fear
But deep inside I brim with tears
You may see my vacant face,
And pass me by with all due haste
But in the passages of myself
There is a child on the shelf
He desires not things or wealth
Only want, love and care
And every night I stroke his hair,
Whisper gently, now there there
Don't be afraid my little one
Tomorrow is a new day, you'll see the sun
Behind those clouds we wait and wait,
To see the dawning of that brighter day
Where we together can wake devoid of fear
Smile together and see no tear
Upon the face of the other
Holding hands like a brother
So long now have I consoled
That around the edges, my heart has mold
Empty promises held up by broken words
Split down thrice, and into thirds
The square root, a pound of pain
Multiply that, and still no gain
Lost and found among the toys
Scattered in a bin with the other boys
Like the martians from the movie we watched when we were younger
We seek emancipation with thirst and hunger
Parched down to the bare bone
This is not a structured home
A vacant palace left to rot
Upon a most deserted plot
And then upon a desert isle
Inhabited by deceipt and guile
So you with pretty eyes and a charming smile
Come to our home and rest your feet for a while
We welcome you with open arms
Don't react with alarm
And once they come and have their stay
They are off, along their way
Leaving us, he and I,
In the dust until we die
Shrivel up and clutch and reel
Until we can no longer feel
Huddled against the barren ground
To afraid to fall back down
It's a cold and lonely world,
Just wish that I could find my pearl
My oyster, my flawless gem
Pretty or beautiful I could condemn
I care about who they are, the real them
That's all I want, just one girl
So I could make her part of my world
And we could share and laugh and love
And someday stare down from above
Look at each other, wink and smile
It was nice knowing you, really, it was worth all the while

My Experimental Art piece

This is my manifestation of sadness. The downturned lips, body positioning, the look in the subject's eyes. Each of these characteristics lend to the overall tone of loss or pain, as if the figure has had something beloved taken from them. I produced this when tasked with using any medium explored this year to create a piece of art pertaining to the topic of our choosing. I used Adobe Photoshop CS5 to first cut the image out, and then follow a grueling process of tweaking and drastically altering different layers to introduce the dots and background. I found my inspiration through the works of the famous pop artist Roy Lichtenstein.

Click to view. (Opens in a new window)

I explored the feeling of psychological despair when a traumatic or emotionally significant event occurs in one's life. I have a fascination with the workings of the human psyche and the capabilities of the mind, especially those under duress or afflicted by some mental deviation. Often emotional states of stress or anguish are the catalyst to the production of spellbinding or magnificent works somebody would otherwise be incapable of producing. Pop art, in my opinion, is a very polished form of expressing powerful and genuine emotion. It takes real characteristics and does not necessarily caricature them, but rather entombs them in realistic drawing-style. Often one particular emotion or expression is accentuated in the picture, and the addition of text can lend to the overall impact of the image. Combining heightened emotional activity with the medium of very realistic cartoonization, I hope to convey very real and touching portrayals of everyday human emotions.