Awakenings

Poets & Writers came this week. On of the more exciting postal service deliveries I receive. Niece piece on W.S. Merwin written by Christopher Merrill. Merwin explains that a poem results from a sudden awakening of attention and goes on to say, "It probably took your whole life to arrive at that moment when you here it." Ah, I suppose that is what makes it so pleasurable.

Without a doubt I can attest to such awakenings. I've had a number of then, so I can certainly identify with the overall feeling. I would not categorize them as rare, but infrequent. I'd like to say I have them daily... weekly even. While they may well occur perhaps two in a week, there can be lots of open green space between them. Sometimes weeks pass without one at all.

I don't think that one even has to have a great poem for such awakening to occur. But the foundation for a great poem has to be there. I have one for example that I had such a feeling about some time back. I was preparing it to submit recently and decided that it that to change. I have tinkered with it for days now, but I still believe in the concept that was a part of that initial awakening. I just know that something, some tiny portion of it can be fine tuned for betterment of the overall work.

I have another poem that is new and I believe attests to that awakening feeling. It is a short three stanza piece but nearly twenty-four hours later I am looking at one line of the poem and listening to others and- well, I am stalled. I have sent it out to a number of other writers that I often workshop material with and I am awaiting their comments. The best thing that can come out of such action is that I will get a better feel for how the original text is working or not working. Of course the hazard of seeking the advise and council of twenty people is getting twenty different answers.

You can't believe how grateful I am that it is Friday. Being the end if the work week is almost like a salvation of sorts. Like a cell phone or something I really need to be recharged and I am hoping this weekend can be that.

My quote for the day is on Critics....

A critic can only review the book he has read, not the one which the writer wrote. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960

BWT - Stickpoet passed 14,000 hits! Yeah! Thanks to all the peeps!

House Votes To Restore Reader Privacy

Yesterday, in spite of a threat from President Bush for veto, the U.S. House of Representatives passed an amendment to prohibit funds in an appropriations bill from being used to implement provisions of Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act which permits searches of library circulation records, library patron lists, book sales records, or book customer lists under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). The vote was 238 [199 Democrats and 38 Republicans] to 187 voted to [1 Democrat and 186 Republicans] Of course this would require Senate action too... and still would face prospects of veto, so the sight is not over.

You can find out more about the implications of this portion of the Patriots act here at the Campaign for Reader Privacy or sign an online petition here.

Want to know how your Representatives voted? This link will give you an opportunity to see the votes.

Freedom

Beginning Poets Workshop in Kansas City

I am posting this from an e-mail I received from Jose Cecil - Director of The Writers Place.

The Writers Place will host a 4-part workshop for beginning poets that will be facilitated by SHIRLEY RICKETT. The group will discuss what they read, favorite poet(s), look at sources of inspiration, and complete writing exercises. The workshop will take a close look at first lines and consider the audience for the poem and the poet. Participants will write poems during the workshop and have their own poetry reading. Shirley is a retired teacher and one of Kansas City's gifted poets.

SCHEDULE:

Session 1 -- Friday, June 10, 6pm to 7:30pm
Session 2 -- Saturday, June 11, 10am to Noon
Session 3 -- Saturday, June 18, 10am to Noon
Session 4 -- Saturday, June 25, 10am to Noon

FEES:

$40 for members and $50 for non-members.

Public Broadcasting Targeted By House

Public Broadcasting Targeted By House

Read This - Full House action anticipated as early as tomorrow.

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Even In The Dark... Hope ~ Peace

THERE ARE PROBABILITIES and likelihoods, but there are no guarantees. Rebecca Solnit writes in her commentary: Acts of Hope: Challenging Empire on the World Stage [click here] a sobering representation of the new challenges of activism. [It], says Solnit,"is not a journey to the corner store; it is a plunge into the dark." She points out it is more like weather, not like a game of checkers that at some point will end. The weather goes on... you don't declare a winner and a loser, fold up the board and put it on a shelf.

For Solnit it is easy to see how a lot of the antiwar movement has done that in the wake of our second Iraq war. All the energy that was successfully generated in opposition, yet there was still war. It is only natural to look at it as a contest that ended with a winner and a loser. But that view ignores the larger or global picture. It is like weather... tomorrow the issue is still there... maybe not even in Iraq. Maybe someplace else.

Still, Solnit has looked for and found a silver lining in many of the events of the past couple of years. I found this particular assessment interesting food for thought:

We achieved a global movement without leaders. There were many brilliant
spokespeople, theorists and organizers, but when your fate rests on your leader,
you are only as strong, as incorruptible, and as creative as he -- or,
occasionally, she -- is. What could be more democratic than millions of people
who, via the grapevine, the Internet, and various groups from churches to unions
to direct-action affinity groups, can organize themselves? Of course leaderless
actions and movements have been organized for the past couple of decades, but
never on such a grand scale. The African writer Laurens Van Der Post once said
that no great new leaders were emerging because it was time for us to cease to
be followers. Perhaps we have.

If groping around in the dark is scary for some, Rebecca Solnit thinks it is a bonus for the cause of peace activism. I can see her point. After all, the Bush administration has already pushed the envelope in many areas, including a first-strike military action and questionable mis-statement of intelligence information. Knowing the level to which this administration is willing to operate, and the precedence it has established, give rise to more uncertainty and that should strengthen the resolve of millions to demand more accountability.

In a bit of self-serving pat on the back, I like that she acknowledged the contribution poets have made to the cause:

"American poets became an antiwar movement themselves when Sam Hamill declined an invitation to Laura Bush's "Poetry and the American Voice" symposium shortly after her husband's administration announced their "Shock and Awe" plan, and he circulated his letter of outrage. His e-mail box filled up, he started http://www.poetsagainstthewar.org/, to which about 11,000 poets have submitted poems to date. Hamill became a major spokesperson against the war and his website has become an organizing tool for the peace movement."

Even in these dark times... here's to reason, hope and peace.

Exclusionary

The wheel covers come off
Residuals taint the hands
Darkening the pep of fleshtone
A stain not easily overlooked
Limiting what can be touched
Excluding the most important

White House Chain of Command Once Again Fuzzy

I CANNOT RESIST making this observation in today's post....

Evidently when President George W. Bush spoke on Wednesday with Neil Cavuto on Fox News Channel, about the fate of the U.S. prison at Guantanamo, he failed to check with his boss first.

In the Wednesday interview with Cavuto, Bush left open the possibility that the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Closed down. The question was asked amid growing criticism of the way in which the facility has been used and the treatment prisoners have receive. Former President Jimmy Carter, being among many calling for closure of the facility.

Vice President Dick Cheney, however, says no... Gitmo prison isn't closing - ''The important thing here to understand is that the people that are at Guantanamo are bad people,'' he said in an interview for Fox News channels "Hannuity & Columns." adding, '"I mean, these are terrorists for the most part. These are people that were captured in the battlefield of Afghanistan or rounded up as part of the al-Qaida network."

MEANWHILE... Richard Everhart, a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet died at his Hanover, NH home on Thursday. The 101 year old poet was admired for mentoring generations of aspiring writers. He was responsible for a dozen books of poetry and verse during a sixty-plus year career. He will be remembered for referring to poetry as, "...A natural energy resource of our country," in his 1977 acceptance speech for a National Book Award. "It has no energy crisis, possessing a potential that will last as long as the country. Its power is equal to that of any country in the world."

CHANGING OF THE GUARD occurred this weekend at the Northland / Maple Woods Writing Group where Scot Icom stepped down after moderating the group for the past two years and Chris Madonna accepted the torch - careful Chris, don't get burnt! :) Big thanks to Scot, and best wishes to Chris.

MY DAUGHTER MEGHAN, rode in a bike event this Saturday morning - going extra distance( missing the poorly marked turn-point) and still finished second overall and was the first female to complete. This is I believe only her second sanctioned event. I wish I could post a copy of her crossing the the finish, however I was not present, having taken the car to the dealership for service. When she came home she proclaimed herself the "beast" with arms triumphantly in the air... I was quite proud of her and wished I had seen her cross the finish line. I'm sure it had to be poetry in motion....