A Monday Medley

This is the start of a grueling week of getting things in order to be out of the office for a week. So much to do, so few nerves left to stretch.

A few bits from my journal this last week:

• a pretentious line from a love song / neither recalls the tune
• tracing a smile with his finger / her red lips kiss his index
• the days are ruled / by tweezer fingers /picking here, picking there
• crystal frost clinging to the bony flesh /of the best face one could put forward / under blistery circumstances
• a mind is a terrible thing to use when it's fucked up
• no one's here but scamper feet / who've come to witness my headache- / a mind with anxious classical thoughts / the Greek gods eavesdrop through paper walls

~0~

755
for Bud

You there when history was made
I saw you in high def
You didn’t want to be there
Your face said as much
Your looked so uncomfortable in your skin

Later you talked on your cell
I wonder who it was
There was no excitement in your face
I was excited for him
You should have stayed home

The Making of an American Police State

The following 41 Democrats grew weak at the knees when Bush suggested some may be soft on the war on terrorism. They voted with the Republican House members to give the president an even more powers of surveillance by a 227 to 183 vote.

They are:

1. Jason Altmire (4th Pennsylvania)
2. John Barrow (12th Georgia)
3. Melissa Bean (8th Illinois)
4. Dan Boren (2nd Oklahoma)
5. Leonard Boswell (3rd Iowa)
6. Allen Boyd (2nd Florida)
7. Christopher Carney (10th Pennsylvania)
8. Ben Chandler (6th Kentucky)
9. Jim Cooper (5th Tennessee)
10. Jim Costa (20th California)
11. Bud Cramer (5th Alabama)
12. Henry Cuellar (28th Texas)
13. Artur Davis (7th Alabama)
14. Lincoln Davis (4th Tennessee)
15. Joe Donnelly (2nd Indiana)
16. Chet Edwards (17th Texas)
17. Brad Ellsworth (8th Indiana)
18. Bob Etheridge (North Carolina)
19. Bart Gordon (6th Tennessee)
20. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (South Dakota)
21. Brian Higgins (27th New York)
22. Baron Hill (9th Indiana)
23. Nick Lampson (23rd Texas)
24. Daniel Lipinski (3rd Illinois)
25. Jim Marshall (8th Georgia)
26. Jim Matheson (2nd Utah)
27. Mike McIntyre (7th North Carolina)
28. Charlie Melancon (3rd Louisiana)
29. Harry Mitchell (5th Arizona)
30. Colin Peterson (7th Minnesota)
31. Earl Pomeroy (North Dakota)
32. Ciro Rodriguez (23rd Texas)
33. Mike Ross (4th Arkansas)
34. John Salazar (3rd Colorado)
35. Heath Shuler (11th North Carolina)
36. Vic Snyder (2nd Arkansas)
37. Zachary Space (18th Ohio)
38. John Tanner (8th Tennessee)
39. Gene Taylor (4th Mississippi)
40. Timothy Walz (1st Minnesota)
41. Charles A. Wilson (6th Ohio)

Thank you for bringing us closer to a police state!

The Immigrant Poet Laureate

Jilly presents an interesting take on the selection of poet laureates in the U.S. While this is not totally new information to me, she has presented some good reference material and demonstrates the tendencies toward NE geographies and the male gender. Much will be made of it because much was made of it the last time, a NE male then too.

In my own humble view, there are quite a few women I believe would be excellent candidates. I am perhaps more bothered by the gender issue than the geographical one. Why? I suppose being from the Midwest I should have been jumping for joy at the Kooser appointment. It turns out that his being from a neighboring state meant little of nothing to me.

I believe what may say a lot about the latest selection, and a very positive way to view it, would be that Simic is a first generation immigrant to the U.S. This at a time when our own American culture seems to be at such odds with our own American heritage. Simic was born under the dark shadows of very troubling times in his native land. I've seen in his work a more worldly view of life and I think this is a good time for Americans to experience a poet with such background.

On another note my copy of Poems from Guantanamo: The Detainees Speak arrived on Friday.

on writing differently

Love this quote posted on Dana's blog - And with perfect timing:

"Inside my empty bottle I was constructing a lighthouse while all the others were making ships. " — Charles Simic

But don't stop there.... her blog is a great read for poets.

A New Poet Laureate

It was not long ago that another blogger poet Cindy turned me on to a poet that had somehow slipped under my radar in spite of his acclaim. I've previously mentioned this in earlier blog posts. The poet is Charles Simic. Imagine my surprise when reading my e-mail, I learned that Simic has been named to fill the Poet Laureate post this fall replacing Donald Hall who will only serve one term due to his health.

This is somewhat a bittersweet moment in my view as I have especially enjoyed the Hall period. Hall was such a refreshing voice to me following Ted Kooser. Kooser is enjoyable, but in my view lacking in the depth that Hall's work shows. Additionally, while Kooser was and remains a strong advocate for broadening the consumer base of poetry, I believe he has done so at the expense of dividing those in the literary arts themselves.

Simic is an immigrant. He was born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia in1938. Living as a child under the shadows of Hitler and Stalin. His family came to the U.S. in 1953.

Like Kooser, Simic is not a difficult read. Like Hall, there is clearly more depth to his work. He is no Bly or Ashbery, but he is a brilliant mind and I have enjoyed what work of his I have read. I believe he'll bring a positive voice to the position.

Women Get To Play St Andrews Golf Course

For the first time, the Old Course will host a women's professional tournament. The finest female players in the world finally will stroll around the storied Home of Golf, a place flowing with 500 years of history.

There has been a sign on the clubhouse like forever that reads, "No Dogs, No Women." Progress can be a very slow thing.

I can see clearly now...

I got a new pair of glasses last night. It had become so frustreating to read for any extended length of time and I am pleased to say the new ones are making a ton of difference. I don't believe my old Rx was that off, but I have always believed they got my measurement of my puples off and so for reading it was a bitch. They never were quite right and over time with even slight changes in my vision, the issue worsened. I really feel for those who need glasses but do not have them.