In The News

• Holiday Greetings from the U.S. Army - US wants its officials to ‘die again’, apologises
• Poetry: electronica style [story]
• Montana's first poet laureate is unpaid, she said she is not impoverished as a result [story]
• Before 'Howl,' the hospital [story]

Just a few bits of news on this Saturday.

The Writing Process

In reading another poet/blogger post this week I realized something. Sometimes I am all over the map in process. The post I am referring to is by Kelli. Her post tells of one way to write poems, the process she employs.

Kelli's process itself is not revolutionary in my eyes and I sure most who have written for any length of time will recognize the process. I don't use it universally but more often than not it is a version of what I do. There are still times I try to force the issue, which is to say I sit down and say to myself, "let’s write a poem about "XYZ" and I struggle through the end to write something I am most of the time not totally happy with. Still, out of hard headedness or whatever, I will try this from time to time and with rare exception, frustrate myself and to a less than desirable end.

The aspect of Kelli's approach that impressed me was her organization in working from an "In Process" file. That is where her developing or embryonic poems are. A sort of purgatory for poems (perhaps it is the Catholic in me that identifies with this) from which she will return to cull ideas and rewrite, moving them out of the file when they become full fledged poems.

The process of writing about whatever comes to your mind and moving forward with it is in fact the process I most often employ. My problem is that I have gotten away from doing a lot of my writing one the computer. Imagine that! It is not that I am trying to step backwards in time, but rather that I often write these poetry beginnings in my journal. I suppose that there are two major reasons for this. One is that the competition for the computer at home is great. You know the movies where the family has one bathroom and four children only one of which is a boy? The male family members find it challenging to eek out a few moments in the morning for themselves. Actually, that is not just a movie, but my life for many years. Now it is the same pattern with respect to the computers in our household.

I do enjoy writing in the journal. It is handy and has become a near appendage to my body. Still, the organization issues associated with it are problematic at times. I can, and do go back through it to rework stuff. But this is not a smooth process and going back to even older journals that have been retired to the bookshelf presents another whole dimension of juggling to find something vague in my memory from 6 months or a year ago.

I may have to start trying to transfer the journal work to the PC on say a weekly basis and then try Kelli’s process.

Any others want to be brave and share their formulas for successful poetry writing?

Happy New Year!

Even Barry is ready for the New Year. He handed me his New Years Resolution list this morning. It reads as follows:

1. I will exclude the cats from my diet.

2. I will not slobber on my toys I bring to you to play fetch with.

3. I will not covet the cat's food.

4. I will not steel your witting and publish it, but if I do, I'll split the royalties 80-20. 70-30? Ok, 60-40.

5. I will not use my cute look when being scolded or redirected.

The Year in Words

I was thinking for words or phrases that seemed to define the year we are ending. I thought I'd compile a list of say 25 with the idea in mind of say in a week or two coming back to the list and using it as the basis of creating a poem to represent the positive and negative energies that made up 2006. However, I thought that I truly want the selections to represent universality So I though for the next week, in addition to my own list, I wold tally up those anyone else cared to suggest and then settle on the 25 most mentioned. So, this is audience participation time. Between now and the 7th of January, give me your list in the comments. Please, no proper names. Just words and short two or three word phrases. Here is mine for starters:

1. global economy
2. global warming
3. emigrant
4. illegal alien
5. withdrawal
6. stem cell research
7. stay-the-course
8. body count
9. health care costs
10. stock market
11. bilateral talks
12. nuclear tests
13. nuclear proliferation
14. liquid on the moon
15. red states / blue states
16. jihad
17. religious extremists
18. neocon
19. spreading democracy
20. truthiness
21. need a plan
22. terrorists
23. crude oil
24. redeploy
25. civil union

Perhap.. ok definately my last Meme of 2006

Mini-meme I got From Ivy's blog.

• Find the nearest book.
• Turn to page 123.
• Go to the fifth sentence on the page.
• Copy out the next three sentences and post to your blog.
• Name the book and the author,
• and tag three more folks.

"This was Lyonnesse. /Inaccessible clouds, submarine trees / The labyrinth / Of brambly burrow lanes. Bundled women- / Stump-warts, you called them- / Sniffling at your strangeness in wet shops. /

Book: Birthday Letters - Author: Ted Hughes

hum... [drumming fingers and thinking] I guess I will tag:

1. Christine - because she has so much extra time on her hands ;)
2. James - because I haven't picked on him lately
3. Robert - Because he takes it so well when I pick on him

Looking at a new copy of Poets & Writers (Jan/Feb 2007) I noted that it is their 20th Anniversary Issue. They have a really neat time capsule that runs through the magazine for each year since inception with A picture of a cover for the perspective year, the current Poet Laureate, Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, Notable events, names of those in covers, News and trends, and a quote. I am a bug fan of this magazine, so I naturally found these annual composits to be entertaining to read.

I saw where congratulations are in order for Ivy Alvarez as she is already slated for inclusion in a 2008 Anthology of Younger Poets. And some of us haven't even started on 2007 yet. Actually, I think she get kudos for both being anthologized as well as still being able to be considered a young poet.

Taxing my mind a bit

"You must always work not just within but below your means If you can handle three elements, handle only two. If you can handle ten, then handle only five. In that way the ones you do handle, you handle with more ease, more mastery, and you create a feeling of strength in reserve." --Pablo Picasso

This came to me as such an engrossing point of view. It seems so contradictory to what advise people are usually given. And while it seems contrary to the norm, it also appears in some respects to be sound advise.