An American Sentence

A blank page is always pleading to make something magical happen.

Crab Creek Review Summer 09

                                                                                                          
Reading CCR this weekend – I just wanted to draw attention to a few poems that stood out to me.

• Gail White’s -  How I Spent My Time Since You Died
• Marjorie Manwaring  - Refusal
• Kimberly L. Becker -  Washing the Blankets
• Jill Crammond Wickham – Even with Clorox, June Cleaver Has a Tough Time Cleaning The Skeletons From Her Closet
• January Gill O’Neil – Tether
• Paul David Adkins – The Mouse in Iraq
• Maya Ganesan – Undefined
• Joannie Kervran Stangeland – A Crow Means Everything
• Buzz Mauro – Einsteinian Physics in Plain English

This is the first copy of CCR I’ve seen. I haven’t finished reading it, I usually like to read poems multiple times.  I was impressed with what I’ve seen,  My favorites so far are bolded in blue above.

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Religious Right & Wrong

What is it about the Religious Right element within the Republican Party that feels compelled to seethe such meanness of spirit?   The rhetoric from such people seems quite in contrast to Judo-Christian  spirit.
A classic example was a sad display Sunday afternoon, just nine hours before the scheduled  1 a.m. vote  critical to the Senate’s Health Care Reform bill, Republican Senator Tom Coburn (Okla.) went to the Senate floor and  proposed a prayer. "What the American people ought to pray is that somebody can't make the vote tonight. That's what they ought to pray."

Do we really need leaders that mix the darkest sides of human nature with religion and then insert it into how we govern ourselves as a nation? I find this kind of thing sickening.

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Homeless Awareness

Today is National Homeless Persons' Memorial Day

A few facts about homelessness...

• Research indicates that 40% of homeless men have served in the armed forces, as compared to 34% of the general adult population.
• Persons with severe mental illness represented about 26 percent of all sheltered homeless persons.
• 35% of the homeless people who are members of households with children are male while 65% of these people are females.
• 25% of homeless were ages 25 to 34; the same study found percentages of homeless persons aged 55 to 64 at 6%.
• Children under the age of 18 accounted for 39% of the homeless population; 42% of these children were under the age of five (National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, 2004). This same study found that unaccompanied minors comprised 5% of the urban homeless population.

Learn more here

Poetry breaks silence - NashuaTelegraph.com

Poetry breaks silence - NashuaTelegraph.com:

“Out of Silence” by Pamela Harrison; David Roberts Books; 87 pages; paperback; $18.

"What I look for in poetry may not be what you look for in poetry. I want the poet to tell me a story. Because the form requires the poet to keep the story short, I want the words to be precise. The poet should help me see by using concrete images. Sound is important. Even while reading a poem silently, I want to hear its music."  Story here.

An artist’s genius seen in pictures of ‘poetry’ - BostonHerald.com

An artist’s genius seen in pictures of ‘poetry’ - BostonHerald.com:


"In the late 1930s, Detroit native Harry Callahan was working as a shipping clerk at Chrysler Corp. He picked up a camera and taught himself how to use it.

Inspired by a workshop with Ansel Adams he took in 1941, within a decade Callahan became an influential figure in American photography." Story here

Set for the weekend

Earlier this week my Poets & Writers arrived and today the Summer 2009 Crab Creek Review I ordered was in the mail box. I’m set for reading for the weekend.

 

There’s a great interview of British poet Andrew Motion linked on the Huffington Post.  Christopher Lydon says "Harrowing clarity" is Motion’s stated goal. He laughs with us about trying to write poetry that looks like water and bites like gin. Click here!

 

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Project Poetry

Stephen Burt of the Poetry Foundation writes that “Project Runway," a popular cable TV show, holds lessons for poetry critics. Burt is not alone. Ron Silliman who has been writing on poetry for years thinks the show does a better job of showing creative people “being creative” than any television show ever. While such a view is subjective, there are few people who follow the creative cultural influences around us more closely than Silliman. Read his blog for a few months and you will see he isn’t missing much that goes on.

So on a morning drive into the city, my wife and daughter in tow, the subject turns to the idea of a poetry version of the popular show. I’m doing my best impersonation of Tim Gunn, the advisor who periodically checks in with the designers to offer kudos or a bit of cautionary advice as the case may be. “Ah, what have we got going on here, a Sestina; nice job. The envoi really works!” Shannon is not exactly feeling the excitement. “What, we are going to watch, segments of people hunched over paper with a pen?” Cathy joins in the discussion, “What would they be working towards, a chap-book?” I counter, “No, it has to be better than that, a book contract with someone like Faber & Faber or Farrar Straus & Giroux. I explain the cameras can follow the poets out into the world on outings… a gallery, a music performance, a scenic stroll or urban bustle and the poet would be talking about what they are seeing and feeling – then back to their journals and laptops for rewrite after rewrite. I think they are starting to see this and Cathy says, “Oh the best part would be the emotional drama when one poet is cut from the show.” Shannon counters, “No, no… the enormous joy and relief of the family getting rid of… err, I mean seeing the poet off to compete!” I quietly think, they are so not getting this.”

A little wisdom for today...

People wish to be poets more than they wish to write poetry, and that's a mistake.   One should wish to celebrate more than one wishes to be celebrated.  
    ~ Lucille Clifton

Blind Date

Yesterday I can across a poem by a poet I’d never read before and was particularly impressed with what I read on several levels to the point I want to find out more / read more of her work. The poem by Michelle Chan Brown appears in the Missouri Review and is titled "Blind Date With My Father, 1976".

One of the things I liked about it was how rich the language seemed. It was ripe with cultural intrigue. It embodied cold war era images. She referenced literary and political people and used language that while familiar was unique… like cigarillo, spray-tan and candelabra.

The title itself is catchy and suggests a sort of creepiness that makes you want to read it although on another level you feel repelled. This is the kind of stuff that makes for good poetry. There is nothing overtly sexual here – more the tease of something off limits.

In some respects this is a period piece. It helps to have been alive and aware of the world in the seventies. Someone born in say 1979 would not likely appreciate it as much. But the poem was well written – keeps interest alive and closes with a great ending line. Read it for yourself here.

I don't doubt-

At the age of 18 all young poets are sure they will be dead at 21 - of old age. ~Marguerite Young

Space Sculpture

The Play-dough of space

swooped together in outstretched arms

and pulled from the deep black,

the whole of holes

to become

the sum of something.

 
 
 
*photo credit- Hubble Telescope  
 
About the Object Object Name: NGC 346
Object Description: Cluster and Nebulosity in the Small Magellanic Cloud
Position (J2000): R.A. 00h 59m 18s.0
Dec. -72° 10' 48"
Constellation: Tucana
Distance: 210,000 light-years away (64,000 parsecs)
Dimensions: This image is 4.7 arcminutes (280 light-years or 87 parsecs).

Here's a Surprise

I guess the inaugural poetry gig didn’t hurt too much, Elizabeth Alexander’s Praise Song For The Day: A Poem For Barack Obama's Presidential Inauguration – special chapbook edition, tops the 2009 list of poetry book sales. The entire top ten list can be found here.  

It's interesting that John Updike's Endpoint and Other Poems - Updikes last book of poetry finished just months before his death, also made the list.

Unconscious Mutterings - Week 359

I haven't done subliminal word associations for a while, so here goes.

You say... I think:

1.Up :: stairs
2.Scram! :: scat!
3.Smell :: odor
4.Belong :: join
5.Doug :: cartoon
6.Collar :: dog
7.Squirrel :: nut
8.Chinese :: checkers
9.Tracker :: SUV
10.Apartment :: rental

get your own list at Unconscious Mutterings

Poems By Heart

 

This evening I stumbled onto a relatively new poetry site that is predicated on a novel idea. Ok, I guess it’s really a poetic idea.   Poet Frank Giampietro has created a web site with recordings of poems that are recited by heart. While Giampietro would like to have more celebrity poets recorded on the site, he encourages any writers to submit mp3 file of  a favorite poem and a little bit about what it is about the poem that is special to them.

Memorizing poems has become almost a lost art and Giampietro’s site is a wonderful way to promote memorization and at the same time expose this poems to a wider audience.  Check out the site for yourself.  I recall Claudia Emerson and Robert Pinsky  as being among those already on the site.  Enough babble about it – go check out POEMS BY HEART for yourself!

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Local: In Marin : Marin Focus: poetry and metal inspires jeweler Kate Ellen

 

"The trained hand does not forget its skill, nor can we lay the precision and speed aside: strength we have, and courage in the acetylene will."

The diminutive, dark-haired Marin jeweler Kate Ellen recites the line from poet Edna St. Vincent Millay, from memory.

"Metal itself is inspiring, adds the twenty seven-year-old jewelry designer, "It is a really weird property--it is really strong and it's also malleable. If worst comes to worst, and I blow something, I can melt it down and then it becomes a raw material again."

The dichotomy of fine poetry and hard-edged metal, is the inspiration for this artisan's totally hand-crafted and completely unique jewelry designs.  FULL STORY

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da ja vue all over again

As Friday morning arrives, I sigh. A good portion of this week would seem like I was running laps around the block. The scenery changes but it doesn’t. Oh look, there is the blue house with gray shutters again; and Tiger again with some woman, oh, there he is again with another one, again, and the Sakahi’s, again, again, again ad nauseam. I’d like a weekend free of Tiger, et al. I don’t want to hear about party crashers.




Lines seem blurred this week. We learn that Blackwater is like CIA lite. But this concept is not totally new. Wasn’t AT&T like NSA lite? Don’t you feel when we purposely blur the lines it’s usually because we are up to no good?

Best Poetry Blogs: A Baker's Dozen: Poetry Blogs Help Poets Expand the Horizons of Their Art | Suite101.com

 

Best Poetry Blogs: A Baker's Dozen

Poetry Blogs Help Poets Expand the Horizons of Their Art

Dec 9, 2009 Joseph Hutchison

Can't afford $30,000-plus for a poetry MFA program? Engaging with poetry blogs can advance your education in the art of poetry-free of charge.

 

The Web offers terrific resources for poets, and among the most useful are poetry blogs. They address a need all that poets have for a circle of like-minded people devoted to sharing their knowledge and passion about poetry. This is especially important for poets whose local communities don’t offer poetry groups and for poets who can’t afford the hefty cost of an MFA program. Poetry blogs help readers keep up on new publications, issues of craft, poetic trends, and strategies for dealing with more pragmatic aspects of the writing life.   

Full Story Here

 

 

 

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Morning drive time...

This morning I was driving I-70 into the city - Cathy is working crosswords and comes upon a clue:  Versifier.  She cracks up when she realizes the answer is poet. She proclaims, "Mike the versifier!"  Sometimes I suppose humor is like a metaphor that not everyone understands.

An Evening of Harold Pinter's Poetry - benefit for the Homeless in LA

This Wednesday, Julian Sands will channel a spirit. The British actor, known for his performances in “Warlock,” “Room With a View” and “24,” presents an evening of Harold Pinter’s poetry on Dec. 9 at the Odyssey Theatre. The reading will benefit the homeless of L.A.

It’s a role Sands couldn’t refuse. In 2007, Pinter himself was planning to read the poems at a women’s shelter in London, but illness had weakened his speaking voice. He asked Sands to take over—and then proceeded to coach the actor on every line and pause.

“He was feeling his mortality very keenly and wanted these poems to reveal his interior,” remembers Sands.

Full Story Here