Vashon: Straight Up for November 2001

Hawk and I are very excited to be living on Vashon Island now! And we are hoping to give our world of readers a glimpse of what this amazing island life is like, by offering a monthly column here called, "KP on Vashon: Straight Up." This title will make more sense when you click below and read the "call to Vashon artitsts for submissions," and I hope that you will answer the call. I can't wait to share all the talent on this amazing island with the rest of the world, so send in your works for consideration, okay?!

Click here for the Call to Vashon Artists, Guidelines, and Vashon Link Resources

Late Night At VOV
by Kara L.C. Jones

Hanging out
with the skeletal remains
of the island radio station
dark studios
luminated only from hallway fluorescents
and computer screens lit with streams
of 24/7 mixes
jazz
DJs
island talent
trolls cottage
rumpis
and those promos asking
for money from strangers
in the middle
of the night
in the middle
of a war torn world
where people are killing each other in the name of
one god
or another

The fans cooling
the servers
the heaters
filling the hallways
but the studios
remain chilled, dark, filled with live programming gone bad
i mean, gone taped, on-demand
and the streams run
constant salmon jumping
fish ladders
DJ's words jumping
hoops to please
the FCC, the copyright laws, the licensing officials,
every word another salmon
one jump closer
to getting back home,
back to the streams
of birth and death,
the waterways
and air ways
filled with the mixes of a small island radio station
the skeletal remains and durges of artists & technicians
who worked here
long ago
leaving legacies
for the universe to access
on-demand.

Kara L.C. Jones is one of the founders of KotaPress and she has published writings all over this planet from Pandora's Box to PoetsWest, from Meant To Be to Flash Of Life. She's humbled each and every day by the treasures and abundance of this world. Most recently she has thanked the heavens above for all the cool herons that hang around Vashon Island. She wishes she had the power of their wings in her heart. All of her writings are dedicated to the memory of her son Dakota Jones.