Bananas ripe and green, and ginger-root, Cocoa in pods and alligator pears, And tangerines and mangoes and grape fruit, Fit for the highest prize at parish fairs, Set in the window, bringing memories Of fruit-trees laden by low-singing rills, And dewy dawns, and mystical blue skies In benediction over nun-like hills. My eyes grew dim, and I could no more gaze; A wavby Claude McKay (Read More)
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Poetry.com Poems of the Day
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The Tropics in New York
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Love is a Sickness
Love is a sickness full of woes, All remedies refusing; A plant that with most cutting grows, Most barren with best using. Why so? More we enjoy it, more it dies; If not enjoy'd, it sighing cries-- Heigh ho! Love is a torment of the mind, A tempest everlasting; And Jove hath made it of aby Samuel Daniel (Read More) -
Lullaby, oh, lullaby!
Lullaby, oh, lullaby! Flowers are closed and lambs are sleeping; Lullaby, oh, lullaby! Stars are up, the moon is peeping; Lullaby, oh, lullaby! While the birds are silence keeping, (Lullby Christina Rossetti (Read More)
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Poets.org
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Poetry Resources For Teens
25 Jun 2009 | 11:03 pmJoin the Poets.org Street Team, Create and publish notebooks of your favorite poems, browse writing exercises, join a discussion forum, and more! -
Poems about Fathers
18 Jun 2009 | 11:03 pm"It doesn't matter who my father was," Anne Sexton once wrote, "it matters who I remember he was." That memory--of the enormous, perhaps protective, perhaps absent, often mythic man--looms large in poems about fathers. -
Jane Taylor: The Violet
18 Jun 2009 | 11:03 pmDown in a green and shady bed / A modest violet grew; / Its stalk was bent, it hung its head, / As if to hide from view. -
Spotlight Audio: Abraham Smith reads "we both split"
18 Jun 2009 | 11:03 pmlike summer melon / hit by a part / from a washing machine -
A Brief Guide to Concrete Poetry
8 Jun 2009 | 11:03 pmWorks of concrete poetry are as much pieces of visual art made with words as they are poems.
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Poem of the Day
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Arion
2 Jul 2009 | 10:00 pmBy David Wojahn -
Buying the King-Sized Bed
1 Jul 2009 | 10:00 pmBy Fleda Brown -
Felix Crow
30 Jun 2009 | 10:00 pmBy Kay Ryan -
Trip to Delphi
28 Jun 2009 | 10:00 pmBy Alice Friman -
Yellow Dress
27 Jun 2009 | 10:00 pmBy Amy Beeder
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Poetry Off the Shelf
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The Power of Barbie
25 Jun 2009 | 10:00 pmHow David Trinidad's collection of vintage dolls plays into his poetry. -
Honor Thy Father's Day
16 Jun 2009 | 10:00 pmRobert Hayden and Terrance Hayes take the Hallmark out of the holiday. -
Out of the Poetic Bubble
10 Jun 2009 | 10:00 pmHow Mark Nowak's documentary poetics re-humanizes the Sago Mine Disaster. -
Everything Plus the Kitchen Sink
1 Jun 2009 | 10:00 pmRobert Polito on Kenneth Fearing's media-saturated poetry as vernacular collage. -
Light in the Service of Loneliness
26 May 2009 | 10:00 pmFanny Howe, winner of the 2009 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, reads from her work.
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Poetry News
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Tributes paid to Kaleem
3 Jul 2009 | 4:50 pmSaturday, July 04, 2009 Schezee Zaidi Islamabad Eminent literati and journalists paid rich tributes to renowned journalist and poet Kaleem Omar during a reference organised in his memory by the Pakistan Academy of Letters here. -
Bard Under The Radar
2 Jul 2009 | 6:19 pmW HEN SOMEONE close to you dies, it's always strange, even if they were old and in poor health and you knew it was coming. -
Permanent Bedtime: poetry, sedative, or just a weather report?
2 Jul 2009 | 2:19 pmRussell Smith Last updated on Friday, Jun. 26, 2009 05:59AM EDT S ome genius has put up a website that will please anglophiles and poetry lovers. -
Edmonton's Cadence Weapon readies new album, begins gig as poet laureate
1 Jul 2009 | 2:10 pmWhether it's in his newly adopted role as Edmonton's poet laureate or his day job as one of Canada's more innovative hip-hop artists, Roland Pemberton has never been particularly interested in tradition. -
After 19 years, Souter and the Supreme Court part, with poetry
30 Jun 2009 | 9:59 pmMonday was the final day of the US Supreme Court's current term. It was also Justice David Souter's last day on the job after 19 years as a Supreme Court justice.To mark the occasion, Chief Justice John Roberts prepared a letter to Justice Souter, signed by the eight other justices and former Justice Sandra Day O'Connor: "We deeply value the times we have shared in judicial service," it says in part. "We understand your desire to trade white marble for White Mountains, and return to your land 'of easy wind and downy flake.'"
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IndieFeed: Performance Poetry
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Hydropods - Pedestrians
3 Jul 2009 | 12:00 amHydropods on IndieFeed Performance Poetry. Show Number 567. -
Dan Leaman - Fistful of Love
1 Jul 2009 | 12:00 amDan Leaman on IndieFeed Performance Poetry. Show Number 566. -
Rachel Kann - Um...
29 Jun 2009 | 12:00 amRachel Kann on IndieFeed Performance Poetry. Show Number 565. -
Ian Khadan - When Considering
26 Jun 2009 | 12:00 amIan Khadan on IndieFeed Performance Poetry. Show Number 564. -
Duende (Tony Brown, poetry / Faro, bass and guitar) - Las Lloronas
24 Jun 2009 | 12:00 amDuende (Tony Brown, poetry / Faro, bass and guitar) on IndieFeed Performance Poetry. Show Number 563.
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fait accompli
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30 Jun 2009 | 9:36 am
30 Jun 2009 | 9:36 amIn The Middle of It All with Fred G. LeebronSo far, Fred G. Leebron has published three novels, all well worth reading; Out West in 1997, Six Figures in 2001 and In the Middle of It All in 2002. Six Figures was made into a movie in 2005.Contemporary novels, it seems to me, fall basically into two large categories; one type giving great attention to physical description and depiction, the other focussing essentially on the mind and internal life of the characters. Leebron's exceptional writing style and point of view encompasses both. Critics have compared his work to Richard Yates, and the… -
27 Jun 2009 | 4:43 pm
27 Jun 2009 | 4:43 pmRachel Maddow's Big CatchToni and I ran into Rachel Maddow who was with some friends on Herring Cove Beach today walking her good sized black dog. I mentioned to her that we had spoken with her a couple of years ago in Provincetown when the dog was still a puppy who clearly liked meeting Toni (the dog reacted similarly to Toni today also). At that time, as you will see in our post from two years ago, Rachel seemed doubtful that she would land a show of her own on cable. Well, I'm quite sure you know what happened since then, now that she is back to back nightly with Keith Olbermann (she has… -
27 Jun 2009 | 5:56 am
27 Jun 2009 | 5:56 amLaura Elrick on Penn Sound* * * * *Have you read Laura Elrick's work in OCHO 21? -
25 Jun 2009 | 7:18 am
25 Jun 2009 | 7:18 amJoseph Nechvatal video interviewvia twitter*********Iran's Twitter Revolution: Myth or Reality? -
21 Jun 2009 | 9:22 am
21 Jun 2009 | 9:22 amContradictaThe inability to be completely and totally silly or to respond sympathetically to such reveals a dead or dying spirit. Of all the pretenses available to most, to be utterly silly might also be among the hardest responses to fake.*****The imagination is not about picturing things. Even if it is, this is a small, unimportant part of it. Imagination is more about believing in possibilities where none had existed before. But accepting limitations might assist in this. Knocking one's head against the wall is bad for the mind so it is equally bad for the imagination.
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Nina Alvarez
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Poem of the Day: One Art
26 Jun 2009 | 2:30 pmOne Art The art of losing isn’t hard to master; so many things seem filled with the intent to be lost that their loss is no disaster. Lose something every day. Accept the fluster of lost door keys, the hour badly spent. The art of losing isn’t hard to master. Then practice losing farther, losing faster: places, and names, and where it [...] -
Poem of the Day: Auguries of Innocence
31 May 2009 | 10:35 pmAuguries of Innocence To see a world in a grain of sand, And a heaven in a wild flower, Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, And eternity in an hour. A robin redbreast in a cage Puts all heaven in a rage. A dove-house fill’d with doves and pigeons Shudders hell thro’ all its regions. A dog starv’d at his master’s gate Predicts [...] -
Poem of the Day: Father’s Song
22 May 2009 | 10:32 pmFather’s Song Yesterday, against admonishment, my daughter balanced on the couch back, fell and cut her mouth. Because I saw it happen I knew she was not hurt, and yet a child’s blood so red it stops a father’s heart. My daughter cried her tears; I held some ice against her lip. That was the end of it. Round and round: bow and kiss. I try to teach [...] -
Poem of the Day: Flush or Faunus
18 Apr 2009 | 1:00 amFlush or Faunus You see this dog; it was but yesterday I mused forgetful of his presence here, Till thought on thought drew downward tear on tear: When from the pillow where wet-cheeked I lay A head as hairy as Faunus thrust its way Right sudden against my face, two golden-clear Great eyes astonished mine, a drooping ear Did flap me on either [...] -
Happy National Poetry Month
13 Apr 2009 | 7:10 pmWe’ve hit 50,000 here ninaalvarez.net! And it’s poetry month! How perfect. If you live in the Philadelphia area, here are some events going on: April is National Poetry Month! Celebrate National Poetry Month at the Free Library Festival! All weekend long, stop by the Independence Foundation Poetry Corner (Room 108 of Parkway Central Library) to listen [...]
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Cosmopoetica
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Aphorisms (Oleg Vishnepolsky)
3 Jul 2009 | 8:45 pmA few examples from a selection of Oleg Vishnepolsky aphorisms: “If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around, the firewood is yours for the taking.” “If you bump into a devil you do not know, quickly introduce yourself.” -
Reading an Avant Garde/Post Avant Poem
3 Jul 2009 | 5:01 amSince every term used to delineate non-mainstream poetry from mainstream poetry is problematic (including all the terms I just used in the title and thise sentence), just take them with a grain of salt or mentally substitute your favorite term. What’s interesting here doesn’t rely on it. I recently lamented the lack of teachers (in the general sense of the term) of new poetries. Tonight I made the mistake of trying yet again to make some sense of the post avant/quietist (god I hate those terms) debate with an eye, as usual, not to resolving the debate, but to read between the… -
Juxtaposition
2 Jul 2009 | 9:04 pmFor some reason, these two photos from Snowball’s Blog (which I recommend even if, like me, you don’t read Russian… I think that makes it even better!) caught my eye: -
DFW’s “Lukewarm Irony”
2 Jul 2009 | 2:00 amIn an interesting (to people like me) bit of analysis, Andrew Seal writes about Infinite Jest: Specialized knowledges pervade the book—tennis, recreational drug use, optics, burglary, even punting (surely the most narrowly specialized position in football). But one of the more (in)famous elements of “research” in the novel is the filmography Wallace includes in endnote 24. In the age of IMDb, we might be apt to forget that the filmography is (or was) actually a highly specialized and intensely laborious feat of archival research, but the almost eight-and-a-half pages of James O. -
Jeff Tweedy (of Wilco) on Piracy
1 Jul 2009 | 1:28 pmFrom an interview with Jeff Tweedy in NYT Magazine: Q: Although “Wilco (The Album)” was released on Tuesday, you streamed the songs free online in May after they surfaced illegally on the Internet. Wilco: As a musician, I don’t want to expend any energy whatsoever preventing people from hearing our music. I think that’s antithetical to the idea of making it. Yes, we streamed it. Basically we set it up so people who felt guilty about stealing our music could donate some money to our favorite charity. Oh, and he explains why the band is called Wilco, which you may have known, but I…
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Poetmeister ...on the road to Parnassus
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Michael Jackson Tribute by Poetmeister
26 Jun 2009 | 11:40 amShrouded, our Great troubled tragic Magic Man- child enters his rest, unexpectedly, sudden, unbelievable. Your demise shocks all. Eccentric or mad like crazy bat in belfry- who cares? Now, beat it! Man-child was music personified, a thriller killer dance on toes. Michael, now hear this! Your Star, Your Life, shines forevermore- like a thousand suns. Rest in peace, Michael. I look past your dark boy flaws- Embrace your genius. Copyright © Janet Leigh, 5.25.09. All Rights Reserved. Tagged: entertainer, Greatness Undiminished by dark flaws, inventor, janet leigh, Michael Jackson, Michael… -
Darfuri Cry from the Wilderness
25 May 2009 | 11:13 pm“If only the world knew, We would have done something.” from Mia Farrow‘s Darfur blog, 4.13.09 Ohh, we know the plight of the Darfuri, all right. As we sleep tight in our feather beds at night, little Darfuri feet are on the beat scavenging imaginary streets between rows of tents bent inward fighting for structure, sculpting organization out of raw air dreams paved in dust. Like many others, for me Darfur is more like a story read once or twice, images suffice, and horror is taken in small bites, no different than eating grubs hurriedly on an empty stomach perhaps a dust ball between… -
A few words for Memorial Day
25 May 2009 | 12:16 amOrdinary men act extraordinary, fierce purpose prevails. A band of brothers fight to the death for each other and the world-at-large. War, like it or not, determines one’s survival. “Life” does not take sides. Peace is an ideal; easier said than done, right? Honor our fallen. Life is war with peace; there is no Peace-permanent ’til heaven’s on Earth. All Armed Services remind me their loyalty: one Band of Brothers. Stark reality sinks in – strangers died for me! It’s Life’s greatest gift. Nation under God, One Purpose, One way of Life: All… -
Cup of Despair (Revised)
11 May 2009 | 1:53 pmTears picture by hazelh3 on Photobucket . I believe I drank from Cup of Despair hidden hung on Life’s abundant tree - or it found me – hiding in low bough shadows cringing – naked alone on the Human knee. There’s a life out there in the mirey clay; broken, left wandering listless long of late, riding a big black storm on a cloudless day. Universal music weaves in and out the air; my instrument of Life pants breathless, a struggling note blown out of tune. My Sky Room is vast and mysterious; on Celestial shelf near the stars and moon float space junk: my unsung accomplishments. I mourn… -
On Mother’s Day
7 May 2009 | 11:21 amPhoto by ArtByLinda’s Lensography To mothers who mourn loss of estranged grown children: We will get through this! Mother’s love attracts; homing hearts will find their own in God’s own good time. NOTE: My dear readers, I’ll be taking some time away from blogging as I’m having a little bit of a difficult time lately. I didn’t want anyone to be concerned about my short absence in view of the Cup of Despair piece, which surely reflects my present state of mind. And, I really need to spend some time going around to all your wonderful blogs which have been…
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Lorna Dee Cervantes
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Michael Jackson: Defense Rests
25 Jun 2009 | 6:37 pmThis is a poem I wrote in May, 2005, right after Michael Jackson's acquittal and after a collage portrait of Michael Jackson by Rosie O'Donnell which is no longer available. I thought I'd post it here again. RIP. LDChttp://lornadice.blogspot.com/2005/05/michael-jackson-defense-rests-mixed.html------------------------------------------------------------------------Michael Jackson: 'defense rests' (a mixed media on wood, a 3x5 Portrait)~~~~~(from a portrait by the artist, Rosie O'Donnell)You, laid out like a crazypathwork quilt on a bordered bed, a numberstamped in the left-hand pocket: "to… -
Ecopoetics: A Poet's Way of Knowledge, Intensive Poetry Workshop with Lorna Dee Cervantes, Sat., 6/27, Wash., DC
22 Jun 2009 | 12:23 pmSplit This Rock and the Sunday Kind of Love reading series invite you to participate in a writing workshop with Lorna Dee Cervantes (who is reading at Sunday Kind of Love on Sunday the 21), Saturday, June 27, from 1-4 pm. Thanks to support from the DC Commission on Arts and Humanities, the cost is $25. The workshop is open to all levels of writing from beginning to advanced—and will be geared towards helping you generate new work. (Our next and final writing workshop of the season will be in August with Terrance Hayes... stay tuned for more details on that).Register today; send an email to… -
Where In the World Is Lorna? Berkeley City College TONIGHT 7:30 6/19 w/ Al Young & Busboys and Poets DC 6/21, wkshp 6/27 Split This Rock, DC
19 Jun 2009 | 9:35 amJoin me tonight as Al Young and I kick off the Summer Creative Writing Intensive at Berkeley City College, June 19, 20, 21 and then on-line for six weeks. Spend the summer exploring poetry, play and fiction writing, earn 3 units of transferable college credit and still travel.Friday, June 19 at 7:30-9:30pm reading and discussion byprofessional writers: poet and musician Al Young, former Poet Laureate of California and author of numerous books including _Coastal Evenings and Inland Afternoons_ and _Something about the Blues_and poet, publisher and cultural critic Lorna Dee Cevantes,… -
Lorna Dee's Keynote Address to El Sausal Middle School Promotion Ceremony, 6/10, Salinas, CA
11 Jun 2009 | 3:00 pmKeynote Address to El Sausal Middle School Promotion Ceremony,Salinas, California, held at Hartnell College, June 10, 20098th grade was the worst year of my life. I'm fifty-four now. Perhaps when I'm 86 I'll have a worse year than 1968. That year nothing happened and everything happened.(sings): "Willow, weep for me./ Willow, weep for me./ Bend your branches down,/ down to the ground and cover me."Yeah, I liked that goofy song. I wanted the willow to bend down and cover me. I saw myself in the willow trees that grew along the creeks and empty lots. Skinny, but strong. I liked to think I had a… -
Where In The World Is Lorna? Berk. Com. Coll. w/ AL YOUNG! 6/19, DC: Bus-Boys & Poets, 4-6 pm, 6/21 & wkshp 6/27; Santa Cruz wkshp 7/12, 7/14
9 Jun 2009 | 10:42 amSummer Creative Writing Intensive at Berkeley City College, June 19, 20, 21 andthen on-line for six weeks. Spend the summer exploring poetry, play and fictionwriting, earn 3 units of transferable college credit and still travel.We'll begin Friday, June 19 at 6:00-9:30pm with a reading a discussion byprofessional writers: poet and musician Al Young, former Poet Laureate ofCalifornia and author of numerous books including _Coastal Evenings and InlandAfternoons_ and _Something about the Blues_and poet, publisher and culturalcritic Lorna Dee Cevantes, _Emplumada_ and _From the Cables of Genocide:…
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Surroundings
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Over At Magma
1 Jul 2009 | 1:48 amI’m conducting a series of short interviews over at the Magma blog with pamphlet publishers who were shortlisted in the recent Michael Marks Awards for Best UK Pamphlet Publisher. So far, you can read those with Peter Hughes from Oystercatcher and Helena Nelson from HappenStance.Also, Magma, issue 44, is now out. In the print edition, you can read reviews by Ben Wilkinson of The Opposite of Cabbage and by Rosie Shepperd of The Ambulance Box by Andrew Philip. In addition, plenty of good articles and poems. -
Song Of The Clyde
30 Jun 2009 | 1:49 pmArtist, Douglas Robertson, asked me if he could post my poem, Nuclear Submarines, from The Opposite of Cabbage, to his blog along with an image of one of his carvings, Song of the Clyde. You can see the result here. I love the carving. Goes with the poem perfectly. -
De-Cabbage Lemon Monkey Bins
30 Jun 2009 | 12:51 pmMy De-Cabbage Yourself Salt Cyclone Virtual Book Tour has made its fifth stop at Claire’s One Night Stanzas blog. I post a few lines from the first poem I ever wrote (more than enough!), and consider questions on influence, pamphlet publication, blogging and publishers.I’m taking a half-time break now from the tour (and from this blog), but I’ll be back on Thursday 16th July at Bernardine Evaristo’s Blog.*I’m back from London and my reading at the Lemon Monkey last night with Andrew Philip, Katy Evans-Bush and Yang Lian (also Pascale Petit and Brian Holton translating). I am now… -
London Calling 2
28 Jun 2009 | 12:33 amIn memory of the tragic death of a pop legend at only 50-years-old, a man who was deeply influential during the last decades of the 20th century and whose music I still love today – well, here he is below:Fantastic stuff. The song segues into my London trip tomorrow with Andrew Philip where we’ll be joined in the Lemon Monkey Café, 188 Stoke Newington High Street from 7-9pm, by Katy Evans-Bush and Yang Lian. Hope any poetry fans around London who are free that evening will drop in. Entry is free but we will have books to sell. However, sneaking out the back door without buying anything… -
Edinburgh's Bin Dispute
27 Jun 2009 | 1:45 pmOur rubbish bin, which should have been emptied on Friday, is still full, in common with everyone in our street and most of west Edinburgh. The reason is a protest by bin men which, they say, will see the Royal Mile "piled high" with uncollected rubbish. And my street too by the looks of it. Not that they don’t have something to complain about, mind you, but I hope the pay dispute gets sorted quickly. It’s not so much that I mind the street being full of bins (as long as they are closed properly, which not all are). But we’ve nowhere to put our rubbish…Perhaps I could make something…
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qazse
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The Dream Chipper – revised
29 Jun 2009 | 5:25 pmRun my dreams through the chipper down the chute - into the hole. Cover this bootless pile with lye rock gravel dirt then seed. I fertilize this forsaken treasure into green blades which bend beneath my shiny shoes as I toss the children into the air and they float down like elm seeds. the wife watches from her windows Put me on the train clickity clack clickity clack turn page check watch wear tie comb hair turn page. Run the tunnel ride the shaft bury me twenty stories above the street in a prolapsed mine of glass and steel. the boss watches from his windows I sit in church staring at the… -
two uncles
28 Jun 2009 | 8:26 pmtwo uncles snoring through the night raise the sun 2007 -
these are the heroes we offer
25 Jun 2009 | 7:40 pm2007 -
always saying goodbye always saying hello
20 Jun 2009 | 11:05 pmwith each wave these last moments bathe our consciousness there is nothing else… (jobs are waiting) put the tiny shells in your pockets i tell the boys so the big ones won’t crush them two buddies - they are eleven never to be eleven again the breeze takes my tears 2003 -
Love Left Behind – revised
19 Jun 2009 | 8:56 pmWhen my father died, I was not with him. I did not know he would die two hundred miles away alone with strangers shocking that big chest his body jumping momentarily- only to land in a dead heap. I should have been there to capture him in my arms. How I wish to have dad back - even for a minute. (We can give a lifetime in a minute.) 2006
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GotPoetry.com News
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Sunday Preview
3 Jul 2009 | 10:53 amSome of America’s best known poets are identified with places that shaped their poetry — Robert Frost with Bennington, Vt.; Emily Dickinson with Amherst, Mass. In this Sunday’s Travel section, Mary Duenwald, deputy editor of the Op-Ed page of The New York Times, explores Cape Cod through the eyes and words of Mary Oliver, the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet.Link! -
Alistair Tait
3 Jul 2009 | 10:50 amI think I know how Yeats felt when he penned these lines. Anyone familiar with the poem will know its about old William Butler wondering why his muse has withdrawn from the tournament of life and left W.B. to play the back nine on his own. “I sought a theme and sought for it in vain,” he wrote, “I sought it daily for six weeks or so.” ...Link! -
Hot tickets: London's going out guide
3 Jul 2009 | 10:46 amThere are also poetry readings, panel discussions and story-reading for children, while tomorrow, 50 Lambeth and Southwark children stage an outdoor production of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner, in a joint production with the Southbank Centre and Young Vic. The tale of the fateful sea voyage is accompanied by original music by Southbank Centre Artists in Residence Bellowhead....Link! -
Peter Demott-Fundriaser: Evening of Poetry and Support
3 Jul 2009 | 10:42 amPeter loved the written and spoken word. His Mom began her wonderful remarks at his funeral celebration by reading e e cummings poem “i thank you god,” one of Peter’s favorite. His strong booming voice frequently smoothed over picket lines, sit-ins, and marches.Link! -
Gnabagangal
3 Jul 2009 | 10:32 amPerseverance is always a good thing and in serious short supply. The problem crops up when the said poet begins to fancy himself as god's greatest gift and assumes the role of Shah Jahan, Majnu, Romeo and other historically romantic figures. The end result is, he turns himself into a sloppy mess on-screen. ...Link!
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Blogsboro Poetry Club
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TRANSMISSION FLUSH
3 Jul 2009 | 7:15 amThe sign read like a beacon, above his head. Lying there like a victim of a hold-up gone wrong. Wiped out and bleeding, screaming “Play another song!” I knew this night would end in a fuss He stumbled out... *read more* -
Odd Day
3 Jul 2009 | 1:19 amtook dump at courthouse and left Odd Day [the Mp3] -
Street Art, Broad Ripple Village
2 Jul 2009 | 11:13 amStreet Art, Broad Ripple Village, originally uploaded by DRheins. I pause to admire / street art in the alley way / Broad Ripple is hip! -
Spurious
29 Jun 2009 | 4:12 pmBeauty inept like a secret kept from all that wish to know a joyous flask so firmly passed amongst our hearts and hands sight amused, ... *click here to continue reading* -
Lucid Dream
29 Jun 2009 | 3:46 pmLucid Dream was a pretty young thing. She used to play and tarry until the day they took her away Continue reading
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international exchangefor poetic invention
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07/11/09: Randall Mann, Kristin Naca, and Debbie Yee (San Francisco)
24 Jun 2009 | 10:56 am[Please distribute widely.]The Filipino American Center of the San Francisco Public Library in association with Philippine American Writers and Artists, Inc. presents:Philippine American Writers and Artists, Inc. Literary Reading withRandall Mann, Kristin Naca, and Debbie YeeSaturday July 11, 20092:00 -4:30 pmLatino Hispanic Community Meeting Room BRandall Mann is the author of two collections of poetry, BREAKFAST WITH THOM GUNN (University of Chicago 2009) and COMPLAINT IN THE GARDEN (Zoo/Orchises 2004), winner of the 2003 Kenyon Review Prize; and co-author of the textbook WRITING POEMS,… -
New Issue of Action, Yes
23 Jun 2009 | 8:10 amPlease visit www.actionyes.org for a new issue of Action, Yes."Dances of Vice, Horror and Ecstasy": A special section devoted to thepoetry and art of the scandalous cabarets performed by Anita Berberand Sebastian Droste in Weimar Germany.Abstract comics! (Including a preview of Andrei Molotiu's upcoming anthology from Fantagraphics Books.)"Always/Only/A/Plenum": Tim Wood's essay on Robert Greiner andGrenier's response.Translation of writers Agrafiotis, Dragincescu, Froger, Lamat,Rubinstein, Sacré.Per Bäckström's essay " "Crush the Aassholetters Between the Teeth":Språkgrotesk in Henri… -
The reading at Th!nk Art: Graffi, Attanasio, Giovenale, Frene, hosted by Scappettone
21 Jun 2009 | 11:11 amthis is the Italian Poetry reading and conversation at Chicago's Th!nkArt Salon, broadcast on Chicago Public Radio http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Content.aspx?audioID=34790 (Press "pop-out" and then the "play" button) Friday, May 29, 7:30pm Bilingual reading and discussion/salon featuring Maria Attanasio, Giovanna Frene, Marco Giovenale & Milli Graffi Moderators: Jennifer Scappettone, Francesco Levato (Poetry Center) & Chris Glomski (UIC) 1530 N. Paulina, Suite F.Chicago, IL !! Thanks to Litmus Press !! -
download the May issue of RUNBOOK
7 Jun 2009 | 11:24 amRUNBOOK////// mai /téléchargeable////// may /downloadableLe mois de mai est téléchargeable :http://despaysages.fr/runbook.html*PARTICIPANTS // PARTICIPANTSTakahiro Morotomi / Lynne Tillman / Jane Wodening / Patrick Rimond / Giulio Marzaioli / Gérard Haller / Alessandro De Francesco / Fabrice Pichat / Carol Müller / Sarah Venturi / Anonyme / Marc Johnson / Sophie Coiffier / Emmanuel Adely / Miguel-Angel Molina / Franck Fontaine / Fréderic Dumond / Wilfrid Rouff / Stefano Buda / Samuel Paugam / David Burty / Hélène Majera / -
Contemporary hispanic literature without frontiers, poetics and diaspora
22 May 2009 | 3:05 pmThe Canadian Association of Hispanists celebrates its XLV Congress between the 23 and May 26 in Carleton University, Ottawa dedicated to the Spanish literature and latin-American since the Baroque one to our days, that include the poetics and the contemporary hispanic diaspora, the forms of expression of the Spanish culture, the Spanish female voices and latin-Americans of the 20th century and XXI, the linguistic hispanic one in the 20th century, the Spaniard 2,0 and the literary approach to the philosophy and vice-turns.In this encounter without borders the Creative Registration of the…
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Poetry of Life
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My Forbidden love
27 Jun 2009 | 1:38 amthere she was, in all her splendour beauty captivating everyone with her smile and killing everyone with just one look; i stood there patiently waiting not wanting to make the first move i watched in silence; images of the past meetings between us flew through my mind, memories of the last time; i did not want to lose this time around, so held my ground stubbornly; countless hours and countless days, it [...] -
Cold watermelon on a sunny afternoon
23 Jun 2009 | 3:55 amrealizing my words can be twisted and misunderstood i set out to do something new and something out of the way; standing in the balcony, watching the people scamper in to the shopping mall, i grew restless and tired; twenty three days in june the heat and the cloudless sky, summer sun shining brightly; biting into the cold watermelon, i stood watching the wave of human blobs appearing and [...] -
World is mine
20 Jun 2009 | 11:05 pmon my way back from the cemetry, crying and feeling desolate, i guess that’s when it began; haunting me to this day, i curse myself and wonder why i stopped when others did not; through the wind and the rain, in a world that i long to be in, day in and day out, used and thrown away; if only we could make a life of what we dream, there [...] -
Towards the sunset
18 Jun 2009 | 11:44 pmthere was nothing in sight running away from the carnage the memories left abandoned all gone in a blink of the eye; sometimes beginnings are’nt so simple sometimes goodbye’s the only way i did not realize everything was falling apart, until everyone i knew was ready to turn and run away; i wish i could say that i’ve got no regrets. looking for the right [...] -
The Cross Of Changes
14 Jun 2009 | 12:59 ammy soul softened in silence with the sound of your whisper echoing in the wind humming to violins in the distance playing a sweet love song; in these tempting twilights, i sip of your spirit in our secret place where urges are answered, and questions are not; in those beautiful eyes, gazing into mine, like mirrors into my psyche, i fell captive to the tenderness that only you emit; a [...]
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Soul Gaze
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No Me Fio
24 Jun 2009 | 7:43 amEs triste llegar a este lugar, pero a veces ahi estamos. -
Ordinary Life
16 Jun 2009 | 6:05 amThis is the way love should be. Enjoy!! -
The Way I Used To
29 May 2009 | 8:10 pmHow do I breathe The way I used to How could I Be the same again Onslaught thoughts Unveil me Leaving a trail of pain How do I breathe The way I used to And let a smile Dress my face Tears is all Trailing the creases Along the edges Of memories How do I breathe The way I used to When all I thought Is not Words ring melodies Of truth But leaves behind A bittersweet taste on my lips How do I breathe The way I used to Without dying in the process Reincarnation appeals No more pain, no more sorrow But that twinkle in your eye How do I breathe The way I used to When I am waiting for A blow, a blow… -
I Can Wait Forever
20 Apr 2009 | 6:43 am -
You Are My Everything/ Eres Mi Todo
16 Feb 2009 | 6:10 amSometimes a song needs no more words from us. This says it all.
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World Class Poetry Blog
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How Many Sucky Sonnets Can One Poet Read, Anyway?
30 Jun 2009 | 4:20 pmI waited a long time before I decided to publish this review of 100 Sonnets. Honestly, I really hate to write negative reviews. But I felt like it was an honor issue. The poet sent the book expecting a review. He put out an expense in doing so - in giving away a free copy and in mailing costs. The least I could do was to give my honest opinion. Some publications will not publish negative reviews. I, however, believe that negative reviews serve a worthwhile purpose. For one thing, an insightful poet can read the review and learn a thing or two - not necessarily the poet being reviewed, but any… -
How Do You Know When A Poem Is Finished?
22 Jun 2009 | 8:50 pmI just wrapped up the finishing touches on the longest poem I’ve ever written. I’ve been tinkering with it now for about three years, off and on. Some of that time has been spent ruminating, not writing, which is still writing. It’s the kind of poem that some people will read and say is too wordy. But they fail to see the form for what it is. I’m not sure I can describe it adequately. You could call it an epic burlesque and that would be accurate. But I hesitate to use the word “burlesque” as you might get the wrong idea. At 2,568 words, the poem stands at… -
Roots And Wings: On Mentoring Poets
19 Jun 2009 | 3:56 pmGuest Post: By Elizabeth Kirschner This is what I’ve been up to lately, mentoring poets of all ages and stages through a program called: Wise Eye: Creating Poetry That Soars. In this way I become the student of words that are not my own while seeking to kindle passion in those who bring poems to me. I believe, after writing for some thirty-five years, in Eugene Montale’s dictum, “that genius is one long passion” and that the harvest which comes from cultivating that passion is rich indeed. As mentor I must teach other lovers of the poem to let it have, as Juan Ramon… -
Twitpoem Chapbook Is Now Available For Free
16 Jun 2009 | 4:57 pmFor the last week I’ve been frustrated. I’ve tried to publish the May 2009 issue of my Twitter poems chapbook, but I’ve been running into some challenges that have held up the process. For starters, I bought a new laptop, an Acer AspireOne. It’s a tiny little Ferrari of a laptop, but it really is a cool toy. But of course, Microsoft and Acer have teamed up to force me to purchase Microsoft Office or be relegated to using it the complimentary X number of times and be without. I downloaded OpenOffice instead, the committed cheap ass bastard that I am. I spent three days… -
Top 10 Poetry Books Of All Time (Hmmrrrpfff)
15 Jun 2009 | 7:21 pmThere’s another top (whatever list). This time it’s the top 10 poetry books. Followed by the top 10 20th century collections. Honestly, I agree with Leaves of Grass (though I might put that one in the top 3) and Lyrical Ballads. But those are just my preferences. Again, we’ve got a list that makes proclamations without any defense whatsoever. It is really difficult to make a list like this because what’s the criteria? Who’s to judge? I’m sure we’d all have our favorites but there should be some kind of across-the-board criteria for disqualifying…
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Poems and Poetics
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Ambar Past: From the Introduction to the Tzotzil “Incantations”
2 Jul 2009 | 7:08 amShe of Great Writing, She of the GlyphsThese incantations were dreamed by Maya women in the Highlands of Chiapas in southern Mexico. The Tzotzil authors of this anthology claim their spells and songs were given to them by the ancestors, the First Fathermothers, who keep the Great Book in which all words are written down. Pasakwala Kómes, an unlettered seer from Santiago El Pinar, learned her conjurations by dreaming the Book. Loxa Jimenés Lópes of Epal Ch’en, Chamula, tells of an Anjel, daughter of the Lord of the Caves, who began whispering in her ear and then, in dreams, showed her the… -
Poetry in the 1950s As a Global Awakening: A Recollection & Reconstruction, Part Two: Our Life in the World
29 Jun 2009 | 6:39 amA Bird’s Eye View of Poems for the Millennium, volume 2What we knew then, much of it obscured by the anti-modernist turn at the beginning of the decade, was imperative for us to know. What we didn't know - obscured by our own breakthroughs as American poets [pre-Viet Nam] - was how much else was coming into presence then or had emerged, even in this most American of centuries & moments, without our blessings. Over the last few years I've had a chance - working with Pierre Joris - to go over the terrain of the immediate postwar decades (1945 to 1960, the years of the New American Poetry)… -
Reconfiguring Romanticism (30): Victor Hugo Translated by Charles Bernstein
26 Jun 2009 | 7:32 amVictor Hugo, Les Contemplations (1856)XIV.Demain, dès l'aube, à l'heure où blanchit la campagne,Je partirai. Vois-tu, je sais que tu m'attends.J'irai par la forêt, j'irai par la montagne.Je ne puis demeurer loin de toi plus longtemps.Je marcherai les yeux fixés sur mes pensées,Sans rien voir au dehors, sans entendre aucun bruit,Seul, inconnu, le dos courbé, les mains croisées,Triste, et le jour pour moi sera comme la nuit.Je ne regarderai ni l'or du soir qui tombe,Ni les voiles au loin descendant vers Harfleur,Et quand j'arriverai, je mettrai sur ta tombeUn bouquet de houx vert et de… -
Heriberto Yépez: Ethopoetics, What Is It? (Part One)
23 Jun 2009 | 7:29 am(A PRE-FACE)In the nineties, I-I began translating Jerome Rothenberg’s poetry and prose and, of course, there I-I found that meaningful word that appears constantly in his work and maybe sums it up: ethnopoetics /// The term is not precise—and there’s no reason for it to be precise—it allows its own rethinking /// One afternoon I-I was working on the translation and I-I kept making a mistake—a typo I-I think Americans call that and I-I like writing “typo” by the way /// Instead of writing etnopoética (ethnopoetics) I-I repeatedly wrote etopoética /// The word was odd and at… -
Uncollected Poems (9): A Reconsideration
20 Jun 2009 | 7:22 amMEN GROW OLD& cry out “shit”like childrendropping to the bottom of a well,uncautious,trained to fish for eelsto come up breathlesson the other sidewhere mothers reach out arms to hold them“holy days” the simple man proclaims,the shapeless wanderernot simple only, he is openthis allows the world to lookinto his eyes, to seea depth there, like a hole in spacethe farthest probe of all they call“deep image,” galaxies condensingin the perfect poem* “deep image”: a technical term in astronomy for photographs of the outer limits of the visible universe.
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Wild Horses Of Fire
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Judith Goldman's The Dispossessions
3 Jul 2009 | 6:03 pm"Atticus/Finch is incredibly excited to announce the release of Judith Goldman's new chapbook, The Dispossessions. An ambitious series of competing voices and cultural affects, The Dispossessions creates an intersubjective field of response to the violence of intimacy, both public and private (or better, the private as public!). Featuring an intricate die-cut wrap on sumptuous Arches paper, this volume promises to challenge the most elegant Atticus/Finch productions of the past. Go to our website (http://www.atticusfinch.org/goldman.htm) to take a look at the cover and read a sample poem."… -
Peace On A at PennSound
2 Jul 2009 | 2:13 pmSome recordings of Peace on A events are now up at PennSound. These include Dan Featherston, Eleni Stecopoulos, Dorothea Lasky, Kevin Varrone, and a big group reading for O Books' War and Peace vol. 3, "The Future," which includes CAConrad, Michael Cross, Paolo Javier, Brenda Iijima, Rodrigo Toscano, Bruce Andrews, Evelyn Reilly, Susan Landers, and myself. Thanks again to Michael Hennessey and interns for their invaluable effort! -
from Externalities
1 Jul 2009 | 1:59 pmChemicals syllogistics We recrudesce around Any place but here In the air they call there When they breathe it inTheir lungs then it becomesSomething more than sharedA private public the more We bear this logistics out The more clear it becomesNo one is safe from notHaving the most inter-Connected view possible Of when we contract. -
Going Places (Doing Stuff) at Flux Factory
1 Jul 2009 | 12:37 pmFlux Factory Presents:Going Places (Doing Stuff) Part II, "Best Summer Ever" EditionSign up now for the first three tours! Seating is limited. Email rsvp@fluxfactory.org with your name, phone number, and the tour you are interested in.July 11 Yoni Brook and Liz Barry, "Unheard of"July 18 Jason Eppink and Matt Green, "Quest for Immortality"July 25 Moses Gates, "To the Rising Sun"You get on a bus, you don’t know where you’re going, and then something happens!Following the success of last summer’s acclaimed “Going Places (Doing Stuff),” Flux Factory will outdo itself and offer even… -
State of Exception Checklist
1 Jul 2009 | 10:47 am1. Invoke a terrifying internal and external enemy. 2. Create secret prisons where torture takes place. 3. Develop a thug caste or paramilitary force not answerable to citizens. 4. Set up an internal surveillance system. 5. Harass citizens' groups. 6. Engage in arbitrary detention and release. 7. Target key individuals. 8. Control the press. 9. Treat all political dissidents as traitors. 10. Suspend the rule of law.**from Naomi Wolf's The End of America
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Poetry Blog of 32 Poems Magazine
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Poet Versus Poet
2 Jul 2009 | 5:23 amBernadette Geyer’s latest blog post discusses how we poets are often ready to fight, cluck and ponder amongst ourselves about how different we all are. How different we all are is nothing new. What seems new to me is a fresh perspective that all of the difference doesn’t matter much when it comes down to reading a poem and assessing whether you like it or not. What strikes me most about the reviews is how each seems to take most issue with the idea that there are only two camps and a poet has to be from one or the other. That an editor or editorial team can absolutely decidedly… -
Twitter Updates for 2009-06-29
29 Jun 2009 | 9:59 pmI’m mashing mountains over at http://www.notellmotel.org today. # -
No Tell Motel
29 Jun 2009 | 4:43 amNo Tell Motel This week, I mash mountains over at No Tell Motel. I’ll be talking about viscous mud and mashing mysterious items in poems all this week. Visit and read poems. Here’s what No Tell Motel magazine has to say for themselves: “Having it all” keeps us awfully busy so we like to stop and “smell the posies,” spend quality time with our poets, which is why our rendezvous last a full seven days – a new poem each weekday. Each year we’ll slip our room key to 52 poets and indulge in 260 poems. Our spouses’ misfortunes are your gains. Meet with us daily at the… -
On Verse Daily Today
23 Jun 2009 | 7:49 pmA poem we published appeared on Verse Daily today. -
Rosemary Winslow: An Interview by Serena Agusto-Cox
23 Jun 2009 | 7:42 pmRosemary Winslow, poet published in 32 Poems poetry magazine 1. Not only are you a contributor to 32 Poems, you are also a professor of literature and writing at The Catholic University of America and have won the Larry Neal Award for Poetry twice. Which of these do you find most rewarding and why? Could you explain how you felt about winning the Larry Neal Award and how that came about? Serena, I want to thank you for the opportunity to think more about what I do as a poet and why. I’ve been fortunate to have many poems published in 32 Poems and other really fine places. And, yes, I’ve…
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A window Within Myself
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Women Cultural Symposium
16 Jun 2009 | 4:21 amِI had great opportunity to meet women who are activist in social work recently. I have always dreamt to be seating with pioneers who have made such mark in the history of my country, indeed this event was a life time event for me. As my company Tawasul sponsored Women Cultural Symposium in Salalah hosted by Dhofar University and Slalah Centre for Business Women. This was great chance for me, not only to network, but to be inspired by how other Omani women who have been kind of leaders working in field of social work and even meet women who are member of State Council. Tawasul had aimed to… -
~Professional Development~
9 Jun 2009 | 1:00 pm~Professional Development~A new chapter beginsI stand there cluelessAspiring for a positionIs it a dream, to get a career for a woman like me?I no longer want to be helplessSo I wonder why I don’t dazzle with multi skillsIn professional development, a journey beginsI’m an Omani woman, who is not afraid to competeAs the competitive world revolves, here I am equipped with skillsI take the challenge to whichever directions that blows. Copyright 2009 Nasra Al AdawiAt times, to stand in the job front is hard, everyday there are new challenges. The need to prove that you are worthy of that job… -
~Come To Me~
22 May 2009 | 9:04 am~Come To Me~If holding a pen will inspire meFor flash of words to arriveWould had held that pen a bit longerScribbled as much gibberish wordsKnowing at end, words will spark to meA light of contents will hold my beingFor finally inspiration had arrived to meLike awaited sparks flashing in front of my eyes And you are the poetry that I’m waiting forPlease, come to me…Copyright 2009 Nasra Al Adawi -
~I’m Waiting ~
14 May 2009 | 2:13 pmPIECE OF MY HEARTOriginally uploaded by rainbow soulI’m waiting for your musicYour tune that I never heard beforeTiny finger tips stringing on my beingBring your music onSeems a lifetime that I spent waitingConnect me to you in a language of your tuneNothing lost in translationAs your music needs no words of languageJust tiny tinkles on my soulCopyright 2009 Nasra Al Adawi -
≈ Poetic Survival ≈
3 Apr 2009 | 12:50 pmlumièreOriginally uploaded by ling_lingIn mid of noises and distractionsWill poetry prevail?When the current is so strongTo just carry us ashoreIt seems life has no place for wordsNor there is impulse moment to poetically dreamYou are the poet who lost control You feel the rushYet the current pulls you downYou fight reality So you can just keep one glint of inspiration A tiny spark to light your fire It’s all you can hold Grasping hope For one inspiration that will keep you alive A poet for one day Yet it’s lifetime enlightenmentPoetry survives Copyright 2009 Nasra Al Adawi
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Sad Poems
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The Moon's Weak Gravity
2 Jul 2009 | 9:23 pmThe bellman in his navy slacks stood looking. At the orange peel in the drain. The hours combust. In lenient explosions of skin. Salient stories to be told to the under garments left flat upon my death. She nudges the clock. Frightened that it's been asleep this long. Teasing the dinosaurs as time manipulates her empty uterus. Division comes in sharp epiphanies. The whole is a lie. The pieces survive us. To charm the window. Still they open to nothing. Just as they always have. Mute monkeys with big sticks in their hands. Looking for something to beat. We fall up. We fall away. We try on the… -
Dark Mosquitos
1 Jul 2009 | 9:39 pmThe ceremony is not in the act. It's in the violation. Warm schism elongates the fetid paths. She grabbed her spare levers and stroked the motor hot. Calling it knowledge. drugging the future with needles from the past. Shifting the mirrors. The words all in reverse. I've been. She coughed. Seeing when. A grim layer of animation. Flushing her back into the center of the desert. Thirsty, she gulps the sand. the timeline surges. In ripples of skin. We arrive. Here again. Wherever that is. With sand in our underwear. And no shoes on our feet. Counting. Still trying to determine. How many places… -
Look Up
29 Jun 2009 | 9:27 pmSad Galileo's suffocating in the length of lens. It's all so far away. The light coming so long after the source is dead. I could never get close enough. To see it alive. Vultures. On their wooden wings. Scrape the bones. Bits of carcass become a feast. If you are willing to reach far enough inside that dead thing. I could tell you how I knew, but you wouldn't believe me. That I woke up one morning and saw the truth. It's over. It's over. So many times before it actually is. I traced every one of their faces with a sharp number two pencil. I drew so many beautiful skeletons. But no flesh had… -
Dark Doses
27 Jun 2009 | 10:50 pmParables debate their language. with sharp hooks through the pelvis. The dark is dominion more than mystery. Folds in the cancer. Scraped knees as the boxes shout their numbers. Small stones to pick up. If I can still reach them. Making the bed. In creases of spoiled men. The jaundiced sex. Excitement enough. For the monkey thumping his stone. His dick the gavel. As the verdict is read. The veiled incest. That draws the maps. The cumulative. Of ambitious clocks. Paused on the siren. Dead children. In the narrowing orbit of her uterus. Dark keys. That only unlock empty drawers. She's had so… -
Cold Roses in the Pasted Vase
26 Jun 2009 | 9:02 pmThe tomb comes in pieces. Formulaic shreds of time chasing broken dials. With a soft voice and a cold fist. The constant. Eagerly casts her lips on the button. Sending us away from each other again. Apart is not a function. Why is not a variable. I play with the numbers. Helplessly remiss to their logic. Hard edges make it impossible to remember the ones I've already counted. So I start over. From the deep gate at the cusp of her pelvis. Using her tits like crutches. I stumble toward the gods. With kingdoms extracted from our flesh. Our bones their dirty highways. Our coffins their peripheral…
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anachronizms
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cmlxxi
2 Jul 2009 | 7:42 am(Like the Muffled Roar of a Corporate Giant)Welcome to my series of utterly honestsarcasms, bitter to the core, each with itsown violently clever and overwraught (one and all!) twist that makes one wonder if I’m possibly this stupendous or if I’m merely lucky to bend a few attenuated ears with a garden variety of half-baked jokes, ha ha, which are quite possibly aimed at countless dull replicas of your very own self, Dear Degreed Purveyor of the Enlightened (known colloquially as Illusioned) Guess. A rather lavishly fluid volume of, let’s just go aheadand call them… -
cmlxx
1 Jul 2009 | 8:11 amIs this our way to be alone?I daresay a day or so of silence from you is anunmitigated joy; it’s several sheer pages of unmottled clarity,a remedy for this year and next.“Life is a Jumble Shop,” andI’m too busy wedging Frank O’Hara’s timelessly snappy coignsinto each well-intentioned day; I’ll drum nary a knackered word of my own into this chest, nor beat one, pithy or not, into our veritable daily dough.Why worry a jot overkleptomaniacal tendencies?I am perfectly satisfied just to seek out that one clear frequency, to pick up a clown-sized megaphone,aim it in any general… -
cmlxix
30 Jun 2009 | 7:55 amI think I understand what he wastalking about – about the eyes. I said‘burning’ and he shook his head,but I think I get it. The long hoursof abuse. The unwillingness toput on a pair of glasses, either of us.Or better yet, shades. The eyes,those pathways to the soul.What corruption, what utterturpitude we’ve unleashedinto the very guts of our brainsand the very moats of our hearts.I might as well shrug my shouldersand, oh what the heck, give my dick a baloney sandwich and repair forthwith to the basement to drool over an Andromeda of… -
cmlxviii
26 Jun 2009 | 8:06 amLovely that Shame decides to make anextended appearance just as Self-Confidencehas finally and resolutely learned to subsist, indeed thrive, on its very own. Is there a massage therapist in the house?Name one higher purpose than Ego. Neitheranother heart-blackening disappointment in my One True Being nor the maudlin iteration of my next crisis of faith will help me conjure a retort to that one. Whatever Magick one deigns to practice is to be used strictly toward implementingthe most current upgrade ofone’s paragon set of smoke and mirrors built neatly… -
cmlxvii
25 Jun 2009 | 7:48 amCaught in his porn-like grasp,the pen loses all meaning. Thiscould be the furthest gone you’vecome, like a steel drum forgettingits last few thrummed notes, or afirst generation iPhone left ina taxi-cab’s backseat crack.Well, I just did it. I justhunkered over, gave in,sent the man one more“we never had an ‘us’but let’s grasp eachother to strangulationso we can finallyhave one” note.Men. When did we startcalling them such. Startcalling him such. EitherI’m evolving or he’sdevolving. I’m so sure of things. …
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AnnMarie Eldon
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'dressing my dead dear
19 Jun 2009 | 5:25 amI blaze: I squibble the squittle scree with my dutynails: I my duty to unhole you you/r control you/r doublelife re- veal have set have aim have determined foot- stalk have in hand my traumaorial my ruled killtag my checkdead stick: I pit you/r throbgland against previous its now eventual poke my wishfist inside you/r clitmiss game fit you/r duename onto you/r lower jaw slot you/r fuckedlot: I fid cordage wet around you/r once pink pocked duckchest let sindrip you/r fecal past is bullets slimegrouting outta you/r wan-throat: I fte you/r tempura-ture steam spout keep y/our unspoilt you/r fresh… -
chewu
1 Jun 2009 | 6:48 amy/our lithotomy decision: I make dumb-plunge for you/r rimrose furl stake incise yearn for y/our testie-pearl my eh maunder offer eh saunter slow-slaughter tongue proffer touch softslice berate buhl-slop seb get glottalam amafor you y/our perinæummy yum yum fake babydollup-over gait place-satiated a maraudernacre-griseous reprobatic slubspotdraw curl smile glint eye all-poretease need heist need pinchaim lateral thumb drivepull’d spoon slot: Irecondithera slithe aptha blob on my lesion-leaf roll lickit-paan into spittle balm betweenmy very rocket teeth gasp thatand that and… -
vhenge
12 May 2009 | 3:53 pmyou/r fake and the must therefore after many eventual edges to knives theirs the choice theirs the active: I the which best? utility array: I serendipitous seaming display my solomon’s riding carpet: I fleck-one deft- hand sudden seeming sweep you away on trust my ah there flick-one sway you/r unawares cut watch y/our flail y/our beautiful tailwing slut pervail you/r splitty fail you/r narcissus überbent you/r miasammed disregard; the butter-one used as shiv: scalpel too obvious you/r fight the deadening you/r escape you/r propofol lie propping watch breath watch head- turn watch you/r… -
Stradivarius sediments
10 May 2009 | 5:48 am'A brave and original work,' the winner of this year's National Poetry Competition Christopher James on my poem 'Stradivarius sediments' in the Guardian's poetry workshop Collisions Stradivarius sediments my fingers fail their source: I forage discovery, play Braille with emerging acuity find a Nile neck force a flax field digest: I flail for durra, falter, dither, pray in sit-reps discover Bruce peas lobo livingston stanley speke steppes along the way: I silt my hope grown frail sliver to lint unlimp, purfling regrets a slow brahms neck to blue white blue white fret: I ignore sustenance the… -
whalk
30 Apr 2009 | 5:59 amI: pave the swinepath you/r directions are a desist you/r desparple of the wise rue litter: I dowse a sweet crack my clue-thorns planted nether by my forebears scent a thoroughfare scarce and runnelled baybare a spent discover a known formal sepia spinthrift agave horse chestnut I shelter in the nowstoeps’ cover hysop-fill my hipbag with syrup-tender, haunt melodies from the pluck dunes the suck-sand spume- shucks and only resolve and only an open and still you/r sparsoil traillage and still you/r whiffle midden: I trawl urge: I tip over you/r tittup-miscue strewing tap backscatter my…
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As/Is
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20 Jun 2009 | 1:29 pm
20 Jun 2009 | 1:29 pmyou'd traced yrself into a happening as clinical as a comedy sighsparked bees of tongue stretch trading gazes drummed on bedpanswas wild a toilet well aware of circulation around plunged claritya handful of toasted collapse deeper than mud to launch up pond-grownshoplift what you are made of like a trader pop goes evolution greenthe artist formerly known as handicap made a lap for waited -
20 Jun 2009 | 7:55 am
20 Jun 2009 | 7:55 amspeak nowor forever -
repregnant
19 Jun 2009 | 12:06 amisn't she not beautifulyet let us precursehow she'll feelalways a step aheadon her shoulderstwhile -
componentry
19 Jun 2009 | 12:04 ama hedgehog heaveclap tramplesoverdone mewnhacksaw fashrubarbaricfalsified hemlines golimpy franchisebee-bromidicnature phasalcompus meantto tattleon the staves -
hoo
15 Jun 2009 | 9:19 pmbehind each you. eautifulbay a iverray ful ful hours are hoo. ehindbay like you know it's all a wate of water. the writer like a river like a aterway. fullness of. of. riterway eye like. nowkay. hoo sky. love itway hop. elevisiontay hoopyway allness. lover ovelay you. eachway. like. this. fullness. like. are there. winter the writer. are like you like istymay. a misty full of you. of
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The Blog of Lewd Enlightenment
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8-word poem: THE HERE COMES THE NEW OPRAH STORY
3 Jul 2009 | 3:35 pmBecauseSarah PalinGot a tasteOf thatPower. -
8-word poem: THE HOW ABOUT A DAY WITHOUT A CELEBRITY DEATH STORY
1 Jul 2009 | 8:06 pmQuestion:Is thereAnyone leftTo dieTomorrow? -
8-word poem: THE BERNIE MADOFF STORY ENDS BADLY STORY
29 Jun 2009 | 8:03 pmSentence:150 years.Helluva Long timeBetween showers. -
8-word poem: THE BILLY MAYS STORY
28 Jun 2009 | 9:23 amThe beard,The bluster;Absurdly enthused—Yet mortal. -
8-word poem
26 Jun 2009 | 7:40 amStreet corner:I squat;I am alsoPeeing.* * *By Oliver Prancer Tinker.
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Carol Peters
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Poetry
2 Jul 2009 | 2:53 amYou can read what they feed you or . . . -
D. A. Powell calls me a kid
30 Jun 2009 | 4:46 pmI'm ecstatic. No one's called me a kid in a very long time! -
Lola Haskins
30 Jun 2009 | 2:31 pm[from Lola Haskins's Castings, Betony, 1984]SupperWhen I told him that was all the meathe said it was like my cheating selfto use up what belonged to him, then lie.I was lower than a black widow spiderwith an hourglass on her belly,I was worse than white. His slurred handslung the kettle. The boiling soupblanched my arms and face.I took up the knife,but he caught my wristas if it were a rabbit inone of his traps, shook it,broke its neck.At my feet hot flies were buzzingaround the scattered bits of pig,the splashed greens.Chloe, you left tonight on the wingswe never found, and I could not come… -
Lucie Brock-Broido
29 Jun 2009 | 3:09 pm[from Lucie Brock-Broido's The Master Letters, Knopf, 1995]Radiating NaivetéI am a false philosopher of thisWorld, a steady congregationOf one, nobody's panther, nobody'sTinny cigarbox, nobody's violin, noMidsummer naïf in Havana rain.I am glad to see the summer dyingOff, the umbrage of the cornfields, breast-High stalks gone brittle in the drought.The headlights early coming on, duskIs an old adjective, color of the blindReading their prayer in pocks.You should have beenA contender, a Canadian dime mixedUp in our own, worthless & shiny, jammingUp vending machines & roadside phones,Old… -
Carol Peters
29 Jun 2009 | 10:19 amIt Is Time to Explain Myself — after Walt Whitmanlet us stand upudder of my heartI am a free companioncushion me softlife is a suck and a sellwhat is commonest and cheapest and nearest and easiest is meno sweeter fatwalks with the tender and growing nightwinged purposesI will do nothing for a long time but listenturn and live awhile with the animalsmoth and the fisheggsa hummer and a buzzerfish-smack packagonies are one of my…
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Chicano Poet
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2 Jul 2009 | 10:38 pm
2 Jul 2009 | 10:38 pmThe Flying Mexican JesusI was born in a manger off Huber Roadthe blood of a child welcomed by burlapthe fields had been plowed under for wintersmell of bare dirt waiting for springnext year’s rain just a cocoonthe creek clogged with stoneshoosegows of judgment day put off till mañanawinter wind narrated by an assthey threw me off the manger’s balconyI learned to fly with a thud. -
2 Jul 2009 | 11:02 am
2 Jul 2009 | 11:02 amThe AbortionShe threw out the babywith the bath waterand now she wants it back:the bath water. -
30 Jun 2009 | 10:19 pm
30 Jun 2009 | 10:19 pmLenguaI had a friend pull the language knifeout of my backonly to have him confessthat he himself had put it thereto this day the stab wound keeps bleedingnot as bad now as beforebut when it does stop oozingmy friend picks at the scaband reaches for the language knifejust in case it’s needed once again. -
26 Jun 2009 | 8:39 am
26 Jun 2009 | 8:39 amHerculeanmother’s milk tickled from her nippleonto my palmfrom the cheap hotel windowVesuvius came into viewbelow, the bar where I had picked her upfell quietly into other buildingsher baby daughter cried in the other roomI watched her buttocks undulateas she went to check on herVesuvius blew its topI felt like Hercules in a dusty jarthe abandoned street stretched and brokethe sky’s sweaty brow -
23 Jun 2009 | 10:40 pm
23 Jun 2009 | 10:40 pmNedaShot through the heartshe tightens against the horizonthe desert country swallows its last pebblelizard begets lizardshe is beyond reproachbeyond help only her haircan still bend into the wind the future has always been an ideawhose time has comeshe has pointed the way made it clearthe meek shall not inherit the earth
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the dust congress
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1 Jul 2009 | 4:42 am
1 Jul 2009 | 4:42 amThe body really is a templeand it makes a lot of noise when it movesSofya Mirvis, Where Am I, 2008This World Is Not My Home -- by KlipschutzThe newest thing in movie adaptations,the commentator commentatedone room away, is Borges!I had the water running.He commentated on:Monopoly & Riskare in the works.Does anyone rememberClue?Released back in ’06.I always have the water runningand hear -
30 Jun 2009 | 5:48 am
30 Jun 2009 | 5:48 amupper or downerseither way blood flowsEmily Greene Liddle, Hooked, 2008* Interview of Joel Gion, tambourine man for Brian Jonestown Massacre, longtime Ameoba employee, and now front man for The Dilettantes. excerpt:Q: What song do you wish that you wrote every time you hear it? JG: "My Little Green Bag" by The George Baker Selection. The absolute coolest cruisin' down the sidewalk with the -
29 Jun 2009 | 4:14 am
29 Jun 2009 | 4:14 amMonday, monday, cant trust that dayMonday, monday, sometimes it just turns out that wayStephen Shore, 'Andy Warhol, Sam Green, Marcel Duchamp, Cordier Ekstrom Gallery', 1965* Top ten conservative idiots. excerpt:5. "Joe The Plumber is apparently still hanging around book stores and GOP meetings looking for work. Wasn't he supposed to be buying his boss's plumbing business? I guess he's having -
26 Jun 2009 | 4:31 am
26 Jun 2009 | 4:31 amI dropped by to pick up a reasonCecily Brown, Maid's Day Off, 2005Ruined Histories-- by August KleinzahlerYou so love these photographs, too well perhaps,and rush to frame the moment, press the shutter,and get along with this dollhouse sagayou had rehearsed before it ever came to be. Ah, Little Girl Destiny, it's sprung a leakand the margins are bleeding themselves away.You and I and the vase and -
24 Jun 2009 | 2:18 am
24 Jun 2009 | 2:18 amPeople be careful not to crest too soonKarl Lindvedt, Wes, 2009Poem Addressing Why I Choose To Write Poems When I Know It Is A Highly Unlikely Way To Receive The Approval That I Crave -- by Peter DavisMy need for approval is such that even normal approval is not good enough. I only feel good about approval if I have earned it in the hardest way I can imagine. If you, by some amazing stroke of
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Elsewhere
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1 Jul 2009 | 7:14 am
1 Jul 2009 | 7:14 amAM I EMO?My comic, "Am I Emo?" went live on the Poetry Foundation's Web site this morning.Read it here.Read the whole issue, including the Flarf/Conceptual section, here. -
8 Jun 2009 | 6:31 am
8 Jun 2009 | 6:31 amMoCCA FEST 2009 REPORTJerel, Cheryl, Bishakh, Sophie and I failed to secure a table in time (having mailed, instead of walked, our application in), so we were on the waiting list. I did finally hear from MoCCA, who, a week or two before the show, e-mailed me to let me know a table had opened up. Alas, I was in Portland, on vacation.So this year, like last, I was a spectator.For the poets reading this blog: MoCCA Fest is something like AWP, if half of the people attending AWP weren't so quick to tell you how creepy and awful AWP is. Cartoonists apparently don't have the same ideological… -
4 Jun 2009 | 5:08 am
4 Jun 2009 | 5:08 amDAVID BROMIGE, 1933-2009David Bromige died yesterday morning. His writing was one of the few great & lasting pleasures poetry has ever given me. I learned more from his work & example than from just about anyone. So much so that I dedicated my first book, How to Proceed in the Arts, to him.A memorial Web site has been set up by his family.Here's an old essay I wrote about his ground-breaking book, My Poetry.Very, very sad. -
14 May 2009 | 5:35 am
14 May 2009 | 5:35 amPOETRY: PRIMARY OR TOTAL ART?I was surprised to see Ron’s review of Douglas Rothschild’s Theogony yesterday morning.Not surprised that Ron would review the book, but surprised by one of the leaden passages he quoted as being a remarkable example of Doug’s pointedness:Mysterious PlaywrightsEven as a Joke:The real mystery iswhy some poets don’tjust leave the playwriting to the playwrights. Really – everread any of AugustStrinberg’s poems?or Harvey Fierstein’s?This might take readers of Auden’s plays by surprise. Or for that matter readers of plays, librettos, and performance… -
12 May 2009 | 6:27 am
12 May 2009 | 6:27 amTHE SPIRIT OF WALT WHITMANfor the hatersA poet was working on a collection of poems playing with ideas around race, class and gender. Suddenly the sky wobbled above his head and in a voice thick with fog, The Spirit of Walt Whitman said, "Because you have always been faithful to the poetic imagination in every way, I will grant you one wish."The poet thought for a moment and said, "Create a non-stop underground bullet train from here to New York City so that I can give more readings."The Spirit of Walt Whitman said, "Hmm. Well, I must say, your request is very earthbound. Think of the…
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The Endless Saga
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This I Ask
15 Jun 2009 | 9:14 pmPlease check out the new forums at Promise of Light.And, if you've got the time, please take a look and listen to the music page, and give me some feedback. Tell me what needs to be done, if it works well, or if it doesn't.I would be much obliged if you were kind enough to do so.Thank you.~ James -
26 May 2009 | 5:44 pm
26 May 2009 | 5:44 pmThe following is all jumbled upin space and in timelike me.I sit here in this empty midnightwaiting room. Cold clean air siftsdown through the heartaches and tearsthat inhabit these walls. The best in theworld they say. The best surgeon they say.These things latch onto the fear. Theypull at it, but the fear is stronger.Open Heart Surgery. Even for me,a man who fears so few things, thesethree words whip my psyche like a slave.The bright lightsblind me. The sterile walls surround me.The catheter travels up and through my artery.The artery is completely blocked.Plaque hardens in the valve. -
13 May 2009 | 11:26 am
13 May 2009 | 11:26 amI tend to hold back information I put on my blog for fear that it may upset someone. I’ve held back pictures, oh the pictures I’ve wanted to post.But now I just wanted to let you know that I had a heart attack on Saturday. I suffered through it for 15 16 hours at least, maybe more. My wife came home from work and drove me to the hospital. (I told her it was merely indigestion.) I would not go in however once we got there, thinking of the last time I went. They poked and prodded me all night and finally said that nothing was wrong, so I didn’t want to go. Instead I went home and lay down… -
Soft Spring Afternoon
7 May 2009 | 3:57 pmsoft spring afternoon---bees hover above cloverthe trees are lazylike me. -
Today's Quote
22 Apr 2009 | 7:57 amI thought I'd share Today's Quote with you.It is truly one of wisdom from Mary Wollstonecraft."Virtue can only flourish amongst equals."
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Letras de Cactus ©2009 Poetry with a Mexican accent
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2 Jul 2009 | 8:23 pm
2 Jul 2009 | 8:23 pmRETROCESOrevolucionario derribado ante el gigante de plasmayaces recordando tus antiguos triunfoshipnotizado por la radiacióndel arco-irisluchas de nuevooprimiendo códigos plásticosque siembran ampollasen tus dígitos guerrillerosen tu mano reposatu nueva arma de silicioque el señor tenga piedadde tu mente embrujada -
2 Jul 2009 | 12:06 am
2 Jul 2009 | 12:06 amTHE MANUFACTURE OF ARTThe man on the entrance with sunglasses was talking on a cell phone, he greeted us as we passed him by, his badge was next to his tie, I did not bother to read his name. We entered the building and I saw the girl, the girl that walks with her eyes. I thought I would never see her again and I was happy because she had endured. I was happy to see her inside her dream. At the security desk one of the guards was suspicious of me, but the Native American was a believer, he smiled as he gave me a visitor badge, and walked with me through the glances & cautious smiles of office… -
30 Jun 2009 | 12:46 pm
30 Jun 2009 | 12:46 pmALBEDRÍOLas llamas Consumen el bosqueLos espejos se transformanDías y noches de resplandoresLos pinos son antorchasLa fauna se convierte en veladorasEs el amor silvestreEs el cariño naturalEs una parte del mundoQue siente calorQue desea crear el futuroQue desea consumir el pasadoEs el poema de nuestros espíritus -
29 Jun 2009 | 11:14 pm
29 Jun 2009 | 11:14 pmABSOLUTELYRotation is only movementJust like love is only loveAnd it moves loversTo strange placesThe truth is the truthLies are only liesNothing moreUsually a lot lessThe world is the worldAnd it is yoursWith a US passportAnd now we canSee it spinningSinking to the bottomOf the seaThe best place to beThe worldIs a wet locationFor the most partGetting your feet in the waterIs not a horrible thingIt is a matter of acceptanceConsider thisH20 is a chiselReason is simplePersuasion is as natural As life itselfIt is those effortsThat create confidence -
29 Jun 2009 | 12:47 am
29 Jun 2009 | 12:47 amSANITYFear is smaller than loveOn summer’s SundaysWhen the western lightTakes the windowsThat face the oceanWhen my eyes penetrateThe beauty of your imageWhen our effortsBecome the only hopeAlive in our heartsWhen the truthBecomes brilliant like the sunAnd dark as a night with a new moonCompelling like the best of intentions
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Me~Tronome
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“Collaboration”: An Official Printers’ Ball Lead-up Event
1 Jul 2009 | 8:49 am“Collaboration”:An Official Printers' Ball Lead-up EventWhen: Sunday, July 12, 2:00 PMWhere: Woman Made Gallery675 North Milwaukee AvenueFree admission.For this event, writers’ work and/or performance will involve interaction with other writers, performers, art forms, media, maybe even with the audience. Participants in the event include Simone Muench and Philip Jenks, presenting collaboratively written poetry; Mars Gamba-Adisa Caulton, working with her own music; performance poetry duo Marty McConnell and Andi Strickland just back from their Wandering Uterus tour; Jennifer Karmin, in a… -
Reading at Michael Reese Hospital
25 Jun 2009 | 9:08 amWhat: Save Michael Reese Hospital readingWhen: July 25, 6 -11 pmWhere: 2929 S. Ellis Ave.[pictured: Bauhaus, Dessau]As part of its bid to the Olympics committee, the city of Chicago has decided to build an Olympic park on the south side in conjunction with their plan to make the city accessible for visitors and athletes should the city win its proposal to host the 2016 Olympics. The only problem is that the site of the future Olympics village is also home to Chicago architectural landmarks, including Michael Reese Hospital, which was designed by the legendary architect Walter Gropius with… -
Why hasn't poetry disappeared?
22 Jun 2009 | 8:57 am[pictured: The "poet" tags a train in Slovakia.]Every so often, I get excited about the discussions that wax and wane regarding the cultural relevance of poetry. This article has more to do with globalization, but it had me thinking again about poetry's cultural relevance. Lately, it seems that national newspapers and magazines have been chiming in with articles about the disappearance of poetry and nearly the same few names are always mentioned (i.e., Remember John Ashbery? He’s the one who writes the cryptic poetry that still confuses all the critics. Or, what about Bob Dylan, wasn’t… -
Unable to Fully California
29 May 2009 | 9:16 amI stare up at the sky and notice Orion, theBig Dipper, the North Star, and see Venus on the horizon.On my sleepwalkthis dark-purple lacquer, a sudden comforter, thisnight,French kisses mewhile the trees just stand there serenading.We really can’t trust this nocturnal sightseeingbut the climb does sweeten, as the air thins ever highertoward some point we try to make.Words bake in that hot moonlight.Beastly pinecones have a conversation with me.Save us from this poem. We need to tell you something.We’ve been watching you try towrite your way out of it and we’re tired.I’m tired too, but… -
Nietzsche as Ashtray
26 May 2009 | 9:21 pmFilled with revolution.Is nothing more delightful than the wind, perhaps a kite-fullshould the last page never returnbe an attaché, diplomat.Just as amber preservesarm yourself with dreams.At a minimum love it in the night.The museum inside the eye wideopen.There on a tiny barren island ourbig dark universe, (but maybe you were thinking about the country).
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negative wingspan
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1 Jul 2009 | 7:56 am
1 Jul 2009 | 7:56 amTo manufacture hunger you need time and a stick and at the end dangling like a fish from thread a carrot. Remember the carrot is withered with a bitter beard.Hunger comes when you would beatwith the stick your sister for half that old-man carrot. The other half, the thread, stick, your own hand holding its famine-machine a foot beyond the other: these are art. -
pina bausch, 30 June 2009
30 Jun 2009 | 10:29 amShe, the world, have parted. Ouch the landlords say--their pay decreased.I loved what her bones could do with her--Always the dissonance stood beside the beauty by arrangement.The heinous sister making the other moremarriageable: a sister learning to feel lucky, later--elated. The work killed, it captured, held and manipulated by eyes it hurt, by no means honest except that it was work and work is honest. She, a cigarette, mounds of earth and pubis. The increase, exposedbreast as intensity, frustration, famine of them she moved. She moved by manifesting hunger in each limb.Final bough: the… -
24 Jun 2009 | 7:15 pm
24 Jun 2009 | 7:15 pmYou never give me flowers, oboe. And I never do.I had a bad last last night.The winter.I was not connected, the dots.One, two, five. Three, four, twelve.The wrong processes were engaged, peristalsis.I swallowed a pearl and this made me clam up.Someone somewhere is a c.Someone somewhere else is an f.If you fish for the truth, it will snap.The jewelry box held all the treasures of the other wife.The other wife is a piranha, a ghost, a life-eater.It is the reason diamonds are cold.You never do. I never do. -
22 Jun 2009 | 6:08 pm
22 Jun 2009 | 6:08 pmNot viable. Presque. I am this close to holding my own, and then they fall off, digit by digit. I was counting on you, I scold them, and they twist like worms in dirt. What remains for me are square mitts of palm. I clap like a baby. Yay for me, phalanges gone. Yay for me to be so unable to manipulate, use a zipper. I high five myself and it looks like I am doing tree. Just for fun I rest my sole against my knee. No balance, and I put it quickly down. The toes are useful in that way you don't notice at the keyboard or opening a door. I can't pick my nose. I can't write, well, only in prayer,… -
21 Jun 2009 | 10:09 am
21 Jun 2009 | 10:09 amA father, a fathom, a depth. I can reach my arms around a father. It is a length of rope. A boat, the solid ground, an aspect for the feet. Be thee there, be thee there. Can such a thing be a shadow? Yes. Can such a thing be a mountain? Yes. Is a mountain the shadow it casts, its tide? Is a long shadow proof of a mountain? What when a father moves--is that a mountain ebbing? Is beyond the frame forlorn? Furlonged? Purloined? Stolen when the father is a ship is sleep. Sleep is where we follow a father, through the fallow crests, yielding fish we cannot flay. They are diamond fish. Hard, cold,…
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POETIC JUSTICE
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THE LIMBAUGH PRINCIPLE
1 Jul 2009 | 8:09 amRush Limbaugh Compares Al Franken's Win to the Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Vote Recount (A Poetic Justice Photomontage)O! From the foul wind blowing over AmericaComes this; a most colossal whore’s voiceScreeching another miserably worn-out minute!The irony of his deception belies an ignoble aimLeaving fools ready to lop off someone’s headAs the mythic shit-stain spews forth tired claims.He is no one’s Please visit 'Poetic Justice' to read in full... apoeticjustice dot blogspot dot com -
SHAPED BY STARS (Head-Lines)
27 Jun 2009 | 11:51 pm(A Poetic Justice Photomontage)Quiet crackdown drains Iran dissidentsThey took off their shoes and plannedAnd their naked feet paced a new journeyWhich now stirs inside every room.Shoes cannot represent this moment,It’s feet and hands and the flame of a newborn star.Ready or Not, Iraq’s Military Prepares to Stand on Its OwnPrepare to make your way in the manner you see fitLike the depth and curve Please visit 'Poetic Justice' to read in full... apoeticjustice dot blogspot dot com -
WOUNDED SCAMP (Head-Line Poetry)
26 Jun 2009 | 8:08 amGay Exorcism VideoCome! Manifest thy vigorous and crippling glory,Spit thy upright venom atop my prone and uncleanSkin, rend it complete to partial bone and space,But above all, Lord, keep thy charlatans away.Michael Savage Threatens Media Matters StaffO Savage, steal your mask away, place your microphone down lowSo your sheep might not listen in…“Take heed. They’ve already come for you,Seeking Please visit 'Poetic Justice' to read in full... apoeticjustice dot blogspot dot com -
THE HOWL OF CHANGE
24 Jun 2009 | 1:06 amSupport Health Care Reform that Addresses Needs of WomenShe basks in the slender bone of sun that has embraced her diseaseAs she lies upon the biddable afghan knitted by her only daughter.The birds of shadow have begun to fasten themselves `round her spirit;On this day the sun will commence setting much earlier than she imagined.Ask President Obama and his admin: Include the vision of a nuclear Please visit 'Poetic Justice' to read in full... apoeticjustice dot blogspot dot com -
FATHER AND TIME
20 Jun 2009 | 11:33 pmIt is a wise father that knows his child. __William ShakespeareAll the clocks that surround us mark off moments as they dissolve;Steady drum of the second hand tick tocks like a time bomb,Vanished down beneath the rising rush Cast outside of reach of all that’s hereOr that frantic hands can seize or bear.Like time, we will travel forward as moments become lean and swift,Instances slipped within Please visit 'Poetic Justice' to read in full... apoeticjustice dot blogspot dot com
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'The Poets Lodge'
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It's Just An Illusion Baby.
17 Jun 2009 | 10:12 pm~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~It's Just An Illusion BabyIt's just an illusion baby,I thought you knew.It's just an illusion baby,This World so blue.The stars in the sky.The air we breath too.It's just an illusion baby.I thought you knew.Our brain is just the hard-drive,of a miniscule computer.So small and so invisible,I thought you knew.Every vision that we seeon our computer screen,is made up of just two digits.I thought you knew.Those images - magnificent,that flash infront of you.They're just an illusion baby,I thought you knew.Each word you type.Each mouse-click too.Instructions from the… -
The Fell.....
10 Jun 2009 | 6:07 am~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~The Fell.Sometimes dark, sometimes blue,the purple haze envelopes you.Wraps you with it's swaddling skinnot letting other souls slip in.A pumping fluiditious sound,of a heart-beat that is so profound.Protects and feeds you love each day,until it's time to make your way.Out into this world so cruel,you enter more precious than any jewel.The purple haze is fading,it's done it's job so well.But now you're on your own,on your journey down the fell.More treacherous a journeyyou'll never undertake.Your journey down the Fell of lifedoes not allow for any mistake.One… -
Tin Can Dan
24 Apr 2009 | 11:58 pm----------------------------------------Tin Can Dan.Tin Can Danwas a funny little Man.He had a stoop when he walked,,spat and dribbled when he talked.He was out in the morning,in the noon, the eve and night.In the pitch-black you’d see Danwith his little pen flashlight.Searching through the bins,through the gutters too.Searching out those tin-cansthat were thrown away by You.He always had those black bagsstashed about his person.He’d fill them with those crumpled cansthat often cut his leathern hands.He’d walk for miles every day,collecting cans Tin-Can Dan’s way.Smiling happily at… -
The Black Queens Bed
6 Mar 2009 | 2:33 am***********************************The Black Queens BedThe Black Queen lifts her Sultry head.Looks round at those who share her bed."I see you've all come bearing news"."So good to see you fit your shoes".The 'Robot Wars' no more a dream.Conspiritors compound the scheme.Digits on computer screens,keep cash control within 'Her' means.We've built the dream of our 'Black Queen'.We can now see, and 'all' be seen.'Robot Intelligence' not in doubt.Exceeds our own, inside and out.The life-blood of our modern worldis cash that shows that we have 'earned'.We are haemorrhageing badly now.It must be… -
A CONFLICT OF LOVE.
17 Feb 2009 | 11:58 pm*****************************A Conflict Of Love.Chugg chugg, chugg chugg,puff puff, puff puff.We know who’s coming down the hill.His balaclava and jumper in holes.His trousers too short,shoes with no soles.He’s the boy we all love to fool,but he’s also the nicest kid in school.He’s a quiet boy, straight and strong.The type you know, won’t go wrong.Though he gets teased throughout the day,he’s our best friend, it’s just his way.We called him Chugger,it’s what he does.He thinks he’s a train,that’s fine by us.He chuggs down in the morning,and back at night.He’s a secretive…
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rooted
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equus asinus asinus
2 Jul 2009 | 7:32 amsmoky mist blows from the greenish skygiant scorpion falls on the marshy landits legs pull out a weed, the wetlands split into twostrange creatures stumble outwith unaccounted limbs,equus asinus asinus- homosapeons"calls out a croaked voiceall exclaim and fall silentscaly body of that man-animalscares even the weirdest of thosethe sky falls to embrace allblue scales shine giving out light"we have a mission, it says,"to go out and spread our seeds,make it as much as like us,with as many permutationsand combinations as possible"when it turns and spreads its wings,that donkey-head on a man's… -
sweetness of my yearning collapses
1 Jul 2009 | 6:14 amyou are not hereI close the door,collapse on the flooryou are not hereI clutch you kerchief,yearn for your scentyou are not hereI walk into the kitchen,bite into a peachyou are not hereI let the sweet juicemelt into my mouthyou are not hereI cherish this momentthankful for the spaceyou are not hereI hear the bell peal,open the doornow you are here -
the sun danced around him and he kissed the stars
29 Jun 2009 | 10:01 amoh yes, he had moments of sanitycoming in spurtswhen the sun danced around himand he kissed the starsand got red roses for her,which whispered his passionhe wanted her to go nowto leave him bein his throes of despairhe ignored her unsaid pleastrampled on the white rosesclosed the door to her love"as soon as she left,in his vomit of despodencyhe knifed his guts out,watching it colourhis sandy grey floor, red" -
wrath of nature
27 Jun 2009 | 8:57 pmnature toys with usI ask for rains-blue or otherwise~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~my lines have stopped rainingwords dried out in the heatI TOY WITH BLUE BLANKNESSinduced by wordy heatraining words are a dream now~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~When twilight rains blue light,dry scattered dust toys with heavily humid air.Grey moon grimaces, wishing for a cloud to hide her facade behind it.Finding none, she shrivels and shuts herself in and disappears after days.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~My muse died in this heat. So I can't think of anything other than the above short verse. -
I am trying to think of stuff I never told you, mom
24 Jun 2009 | 9:10 pmI am trying to think of stuff I never told you, mompractically everything about me you have knownright from the day I issued forth from your wombyes, I never asked you those algebraic problemsthose long chemical equations and Physics sumswithout my asking you drove away my phantomsthis aries daughter of yours has been so headstrongin your eyes she has not done anything wrongeven when your thoughts were linear, hers oblongyet there are parts of me you will never ever knowwhen I turned towards him, bonding with you I let gointense feelings for him, are not for any kind of show"a time comes…
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something katy
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red, white and blue
3 Jul 2009 | 10:23 amhappy 4th! -
asexual stevedore
29 Jun 2009 | 8:02 pmfor jenni bakeri saw an old mexican totting a cigarhis belly a mild bulge from beer and salsa con quesoconstruction workers building boats in locksin skullies and sullen brows in Essexignore Carmen's dance, the floral teasewho pleasures herself then cries to sleep on the weekendstheir interconnected miserable desires missed outto the bear learning tricks for the circus -
Eulogy to Pa
29 Jun 2009 | 9:15 amRobert Regan, affectionatly known to me as Pa, was born on October 31st of 1934 and died on June 10th of 2009. His funeral service was held at St. Mary's in Dedham on June 26th. I read the following at his service:Pa had a red pick up truck. When I was little. I don’t know exactly how little… when we lived in the apartments at Bahama Drive and he would come visit, I could see his red truck from -
bio grog
29 Jun 2009 | 5:00 am(a pro-earth pirate mission statement)ahar! least i be worried, yar,of the land be gettin' smallerfor i am a beard what sails the seasof the world from port to portbut the fishin' been sparsesince you land lubbers startedharken yer cares to the waysideand killin' all yer animals and treeshow's a pirate to avoid gettin' scurvyif you lubbers can't grow a lime? harhar!so i be brewing a new -
human cat
25 Jun 2009 | 8:27 amrowdy learned to drink water from a bottle after seeing his big bro jack do it.now whenever anyone drinks water water from a bottle, rowdy wants some too. he's cute, but annoyingly persistant.image by ana-maria bell
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They Shoot Poets - Don't They?
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...Good
27 Jun 2009 | 10:39 am -
.....Somethin'.....
27 Jun 2009 | 10:35 am -
Smokin'....
27 Jun 2009 | 10:29 am -
I Heard it From a Friend... Who Heard it From a Friend....
10 Jun 2009 | 12:29 pmThe 5th AnnualCALGARYBLOW-OUT!7 Events Over 3 Days!Thursday July 2 to Saturday July 4This dangerously explosive festival, benefit, and launch for Filling Station Magazine and NoD Magazine once again puts the spotlight on Calgary’s innovative writing & arts community with7 exciting events featuring readings, performances, concerts, art, film, and more!TICKETS: $5 per Performance Event, $8 per Exploding Concert, or $20 Festival Pass. Available Now at Megatunes, Pages Books on Kensington, and Sloth Records!BLOW-OUT SCHEDULE 2009Event A: Flywheel Throwdown & NoD Magazine Launch!Thursday… -
Poetry in Vitro....I Lost Count
31 May 2009 | 2:50 pmThe Sealed FountainI'm in a room.It's smaller than I thoughtit would be.The verticals, though closedallow slivers of sunlight to hitthe wooden slats on the floor, to formparallel bars of incandescence.In the corner is a futonthat has seen better times.I am sitting on a folding chairat the center of my world.I am a sealed fountain spewing.
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this is all your fault
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29 Jun 2009 | 9:57 am
29 Jun 2009 | 9:57 amThanks to all who commented! I got some insights. However, sorry, publisher didn't any as is. She sorta a little liked the middle one, if I retool it.So here's a new painting. Has nothing to do with a cover. -
20 Jun 2009 | 9:51 am
20 Jun 2009 | 9:51 amIdeas for new covers. (All previous were rejected.)A)Roman Numeral V) 16a)You know the drill. Please vote please please. -
11 Jun 2009 | 12:03 pm
11 Jun 2009 | 12:03 pmHannah and the Ill-fitting WigHannah has dirtyhair, I tell you throughthe open window. She isa dirty blonde. Youshake your head at me,pushing your shoppingcart as your yellowlab trudges ahead,his heavy bellybobbing from sideto side. You startto sing about the flagagain, adjusting yourflowered hat, leavingpaper petals withevery unsteady step. -
6 Jun 2009 | 4:30 pm
6 Jun 2009 | 4:30 pmSometimes I feel Nostalgiafor Places I was MiserableEveryone operates out of fear. With herhands, she opens up a hole in the earthnear the roots of the big maple. She laysa silent bluebird in the hole, pats it.In the movie version, she places a driedgeranium over the bird's eye -- its headis tipped to one side, so only the lefteye is showing. Are you feelingespecially needy today? She -
18 May 2009 | 11:11 am
18 May 2009 | 11:11 amThe ColdThe virus traveled to her blood after her fingertips brushed the hem of his coat, he was leaving againin the middle of the night, the baby crying, the heat turned off a week ago – she had collected matches, triedto empty the throat of the fireplace, tried to take out the bricks blockingthe chimney with her sewing scissors and a butter knife so she could pilea chair or two, perhaps some of
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Uncle David
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Sleeping
3 Jul 2009 | 4:01 pmSleepingIs being unawareOf the world.The T V playsI do not near itI snoreI do not hear it.Dream realityControl.The places I go;Denver mixed with BoulderSt. Louis with Boston.This is no little deathAs some poets wasHave us believe.There is light in the darknessOf our dream head.SleepThe birds can not wake meWith the meldy of their songs.It is rush hour in my headI shall little rememberWhat is saidPoetry and thoughts on my life -
I am Americus
3 Jul 2009 | 3:59 pmI am AmericusI am AmericusKnow me by PolishKnow me by IrishMy skin darkIn its brownnessCall me Ginsburg,Rys and VorhiesMy brothers call me PadmaMy sisters call me Circe.I am Corso, TarquinoBrownstein and Mohammad.The sum of my wholeIs the measure of my American soul.The Rocky MountainIs my back bone.I am a janitor in East St. LouisI do not speak English in ArizonaI landscape DenverFarm pigs in Mississippi,I cut hair in BostonCollect trash in MilwaukeeI am a painter and a poetCall me Waldman and PoundCall me Tennessee and T. S. and Teasdale.Call me running Bear and RhiannoThere is Italian in… -
The Mulberry tress
1 Jul 2009 | 2:10 amThe Mulberry tressThe overhangs the fenceDrop its fruitsTo stain theConcrete purple bird poopOn the driveway.Poetry and thoughts on my life -
Under the Spring Rain
30 Jun 2009 | 4:37 pmA woman collecting cans from the dumpsterWith her baby in a strollerDo not care that the spring rain is falling.Poetry and thoughts on my life -
Lick the skin
30 Jun 2009 | 4:23 pmLick the skinThen a pocketCrease at one endFill with mary janePress the skinBetween fore fingerAnd thumbLick the skinLight and enjoyMy friend.Poetry and thoughts on my life
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Watermark
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This is Your Life
2 Jul 2009 | 10:09 amXX by nwolc MP3 File A wood. All branches bare, except for the hundreds of tiny lizards hanging by their tails, crooked legs stretched out, tiny hands reaching, bodies swaying in the almost visible breeze, black limbs, white sky, then a meadow, tall grasses, wildflowers, a wooden chair standing in the meadow, many-times-painted many colors, layer after layer, year after year, weather-crackled, bubbled, chipped and paled. You see him, Weather, an old craftsman in worn coveralls, bent over the chair, carefully working away with ancient tools, carving that valued antique patina, as if it had… -
What I'll Never Tell You
24 Jun 2009 | 10:11 pm1 I did go out that summer day with an old lover, into the mountains. We had a meal by the river, then lay together and made love on the scratchy blanket. 2 Peonies make me think of you, how they open, and open, unfolding petal after petal, so lush, so brazen; how we chased each other, room to room, naked and ecstatic. 3 If you had asked, I would have gone with you. I would have left all rules behind, followed you, led the way into that unknown wilderness, that anarchy of desire. This week's prompt was what i could never tell my mother. I changed it just a bit. -
Summer Solstice | Sitka, Alaska | 1993
21 Jun 2009 | 4:13 pmThis day blooms under wide meadows of sky. We lay our sun-stunned bodies in constellations of clover and buttercups. Salmonberry bubbles of sweet red light break on our tongues. Shooting stars in the flowerbeds, pollen in our sheets. For an audio post of this poem, go here. -
The House-Bound Ventures Out
16 Jun 2009 | 3:59 pmshe prepares for days hoarding energy / fireflies in a glass jar /examines clothing for marks of wear / a hole in the knee / buttons cracked or missing / missing / stains on the embroidered breast / amulets in the pocket / earrings finger rings / key ringher eyes widen / she can feel the lids stretch / at the distant horizon / far mountains / clouds / the river high dark fast / pulling / at its banks trees bent down in the watera drive through the neighborhood of biography / victorian towered flats the hall of a bed / bath in three rooms claw-foot tub / pedestal sink / time cracked / old… -
April - May - June 02009
11 Jun 2009 | 11:38 am2009-06-10 the lives of thousands rest on his shoulders the enemy is vile and wily he is strong enough to carry this weight he is strong enough to meet this enemy he is strong, he is brave he is willing to die for what is right these people, if you can call them that care for nothing, value nothing they do not respect life as we do they do not treasure family and god he must be strong, he must be brave he must be willing to die for what is right he has prepared for this moment for this, he was born for this, he worked to become strong for this, he is brave, for this he is strong enough to…
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Wordplay Poetry Blog
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Happy in Heaven Poem by H. E. Hasben
8 Jun 2009 | 8:03 pmHow do caterpillars turn into a liquid then into a butterfly? Why is gold yellow? Is Elvis really dead? Do computers think? Are monkeys evolving? Can you be happy in heaven when you know I’m suffering in hell? What does this say about you? -
Sunshine Poem by David Michael Jackson
7 Jun 2009 | 7:08 pmOh sunshine at last! The sun strikes me and I strike the keys this time, this time that has been given to me. This time the fingers react to the muse, the leaves to the light, the bees to the wiggle of the dance. There is honey this way. This way! Leave your doldrums behind. What will they say, that you smiled too often, that you were [...] -
Darling Darling Darling Lyrics by David Michael Jackson
23 May 2009 | 1:27 pmI was wondering what she meant When she said “It’s time to face the truth.” It was the message that she sent, The strength to take bad news. She said “Darlin’ darlin’ darling do you love me? Darlin’ darlin’ darling do you care? Darlin’ darlin’ are you thinking of me Darling will you always be there. It took me by surprise then I realized How [...] -
In This Place Poem by David Michael Jackson
22 May 2009 | 7:56 pmI need to write again he says quietly. to share this sense of location, to sing I am still here quietly sharing my moments in this place this place, this place. Write before the reaper gets you before you have nothing left to say. Leave a few words amid the billions of eons. Leave a visible breath in the cold air. Cry tears, sing verses, lift the years into your arms and [...] -
Flower Petals Poem by Summer Breeze
14 May 2009 | 1:31 pm
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mygorgeoussomewhere.org
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read write poem #81: human/animal image prompt
XX by oncle Jim Carousel An otherwise ordinary day, blades of grass leaning into the light. Sky meets surface only at the horizon. My hair is pocked with dew burns. My vision folds in like dry-edged petals. The spinning starts, a slow, sickening rotation. Men with the heads of kangaroos, bison and zebras force their way inside my legs. I climb ... -
things that get said in workshops
"You talk about pregnant raindrops and chaos and auditory canals and 'the passing of time' as 'an orifice,' when you could really just be talking about humidity and ears." "Weren't these characters hurting each other in the last version of this story? Bring back the violence!" "It's your story, your voice, your ... -
read write poem #80: telling all
Where Did Your Mother Live? -- after Barbara Jane Reyes writing after Claire Kageyama-Ramakrishnan Where did your mother live? In Oklahoma. Where did your mother live? Lying on the grass, head resting on the neck of a horse who was also lying on the grass. Where did your mother live? The back of a girl’s bicycle, candy cigarette in ... -
my weekly microblog digest
That's it. No more robots in the living room. Period. # Crap. I just got a business card stuck to my lower lip. Oh wait. Now it's stuck to my upper lip, too. # Sometimes when I'm thinking, I use air quotes around certain words. I wonder what that's about. # Using my ... -
curing the animal, by ivy alvarez
My husband hands me the animal. A soft neck roll and a dead eye, a lustreless fur that I must touch to strip and salt and peg to dry. He is away all the day in the dust. a eucalypt oil smell taints his neck he comes to me bones meeting mine a hard fit a green lawn at ...
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Read Write Poem
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read write prompt #82: ode to your homunculus
2 Jul 2009 | 10:00 pmGreetings fellow travelers, wranglers and companions of the soul. This is my first prompt, and I’m glad to be part of this amazing community. Now let’s get physical. A little man in a little blue suit One of my favorite movies from the ’90s was The Doors, with one of my favorite scenes being when Jim Morrison (played by Val Kilmer, in case you missed it) was maced, then went on stage and essentially, in all his Morrisonness, nearly provoked a riot. In the middle of the band’s opening song, Morrison — and who knows how much of this is based on actual accounts from… -
get your poem on #81
1 Jul 2009 | 10:00 pmWere you able to respond to this week’s image prompt by oncle Jim? Perhaps you talked about a land of animal-headed humans or about how strange you feel in your own skin sometimes, at once human and not human. Maybe you depicted a surreal landscape populated by all manner of strange creatures. Whatever you wrote, we can’t wait to see how you responded to the image. Remember to link back to here in your posts, either with a hyperlink to Read Write Poem or by using the badge in your post. Sidebar links are great, but it helps our “internet health” when you link in every post you… -
read write poem friends in ourboros review
1 Jul 2009 | 8:59 amIssue 3 of Ouroboros Review is live and includes the work of Dustin Brookshire, James Brush, Joyce Ellen Davis, Michelle McGrane and Carolee Sherwood! (Did we miss you? Tell us! Email news (at) readwritepoem (dot) org. Or send us your news!) -
‘queens of poetry’ seeking submissions
28 Jun 2009 | 10:01 pmDustin Brookshire’s Queens of Poetry anthology submission deadline is Sept. 30. Go here for more information. -
bill moyers’ in-depth interview with w.s.merwin
27 Jun 2009 | 8:12 am“W.S. Merwin join[ed] Bill Moyers for a wide-ranging conversation about language, his writing process, the natural world, and the insights gleaned from a much-lauded career of more than 50 years.” He also read a great many of the poems from this year’s Pulitzer prize-winning The Shadow of Sirius, published by Copper Canyon Press. This excellent program aired on June 26 and is well-worth the watch. Find it here, on PBS.
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Chris Weige
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Rambo and Rimbaud
26 Jun 2009 | 5:53 pmvia flickr.com via The Joseph Boys Posted via web from Reckon -
Is Everybody In?
26 Jun 2009 | 5:53 pmvia youtube.com via http://twitter.com/pareidoliac Posted via web from Reckon -
Mark Twain Soda Machine
26 Jun 2009 | 4:25 pmvia flickr.com Hannibal, Missouri via Chicago Man’s flickr Posted via web from Reckon -
Astarte Psychedelic Ballet
26 Jun 2009 | 11:05 amvia thenonist.com In 1967 a ballet came to the stage which became an absolute sensation. It was called Astarte, after a naked semitic Goddess of fertility, sexuality, and war, who’d eventually be absorbed by the Greeks under the name Aphrodite. Choreographed and directed by one Robert Joffrey it was considered groundbreaking in its staging and it remains the only ballet to ever grace the cover of Time magazine. via the nonist (more here) photo: herb migdoll Posted via web from Reckon -
Story of the Eye
26 Jun 2009 | 11:05 amHistoire de l’oeil - Story of the Eye - Georges Bataille Music by Gato Barbieri Film by Javier Mayoral via ronpolla Posted via email from Reckon
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The PR
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Poem
30 Jun 2009 | 7:45 pmIt's ok that you don't have a clue. I still love you! Read and post comments | Send to a friend -
Up
24 Jun 2009 | 8:41 amRead and post comments | Send to a friend -
being to timelessness as it's to time
7 Jun 2009 | 5:07 ambeing to timelessness as it's to time love did no more begin than love will end; where nothing is to breathe to stroll to swim love is the air the ocean and the land (do lovers suffer?all divinities proudly descending put on deathful flesh: ar... Read and post comments | Send to a friend -
A Woman Once Told Me
5 Jun 2009 | 11:41 amLess said, soonest mended. Read and post comments | Send to a friend -
The Molly McGuires
2 Jun 2009 | 5:18 pmA Colombian vibe in a Pennsylvania village a restaurant the color of satsumas: Tyrants on the wall a pastel gun in the face of the established rock that is the path The nose The taste of smell (like pungent necks) but we smell like wine and cigar... Read and post comments | Send to a friend
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Sillman's Blog
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1 Jul 2009 | 9:01 pm
1 Jul 2009 | 9:01 pm“Disjunction is dead.” Dale Smith on the con in F-Con Po § Scene report: Studio One in Oakland § From haiku to sijo § Marcella Durand on the scene in France Plus these two accounts of the POEM/FACE Festival 12 poets, 7 translators, 4 events, 2 countries, 1 publication § Matthea Harvey reading to Philip Glass’ “String Quartet No. 5” as performed by the Miró Quartet Harvey’s text § The messy garden of contemporary poetics § Expat artists watch Iranian revolt from afar § Borges in Iran § Annie Finch is running with the wolves § Julian Kornhauser’s Been and Gone § What is… -
30 Jun 2009 | 9:01 pm
30 Jun 2009 | 9:01 pmBooks Received Poetry Marie Buck, Life & Style, Patrick Lovelace Editions, Brooklyn 2009 Amy Catanzano, Multiversal, Fordham University Press,New York 2009 Joel Chace, matter no matter, Paper Kite Press, Kingston, PA 2008 Joel Chace, A Script, Otoliths, Rockhampton, Australia 2009 René Char, The Brittle Age and Returning Upland, translated by Gustaf Sobin, with a foreward by Mary Ann Caws, Counterpath Press, Denver 2009 Jordan Davis, From Orange to Pink, Fewer & Further Press, Wendell, MA 2009 Olena Kalytiak Davis, On the Kitchen Table From Which Everything Has Been Hastily… -
29 Jun 2009 | 9:01 pm
29 Jun 2009 | 9:01 pmAbout two hours after I posted my note about American Hybrid Wednesday morning, one of my kids had a medical emergency & ended up in the hospital. Which explains why things here have been a little ragged since then. He's home now, but I'm at one least week behind on everything, including breathing, so it will take awhile to get back up to speed. -
28 Jun 2009 | 9:01 pm
28 Jun 2009 | 9:01 pmSharon Mesmer on flarf (et al) in Poetry Stan Apps close reads the issue K. Silem Mohammad’s “Sonnagrams” from Shakespeare Flarf & truth § Simin Behbahani, Iran’s National Poet, speaks out § Remembering David Bromige & Gerry Gilbert § C.S. Perez on José Garcia Villa § Stephen Ratcliffe & Ron Padgett on how poets read § Contextually reading Hank Lazer’s Portions § Andrew Wessels with a different take on American Hybrid § William Carlos Williams reading in the 1940s § Anne Boyer & the edge of dream § Geof Huth on Nico Vassilakis § Can Seamus Heaney save the… -
27 Jun 2009 | 9:01 pm
27 Jun 2009 | 9:01 pmJames Baker Hall 1935 2009 § Greg Hall 1946 2009
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Poetry Hut Blog
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Poetry News For July 3, 2009
2 Jul 2009 | 10:39 pm— Amy Lowell As a Leader in Contemporary Letters; MRS. MEYNELL’S ESSAYS, January 29, 1922, Sunday Section: Book Review & Magazine — — Is the State of Contemporary Poetry Healthy? – Quote of the Day / William Logan — — Poetry scrubbed out — — Waterboys set Yeats poems to music — — “The machine was an IBM electronic computer—one of the new “giant brains” which differ from previous computing and tabulating machines in that they function with the speed of light— 186,000 miles per second.” — —… -
Poetry News For July 2, 2009
1 Jul 2009 | 10:00 pm— POETS WHO MUST OR WHO MAY WRITE; Three Writers of Verse Whose Work Illustrates Afresh the Wisdom of Horace E. Scudder’s Two Questions THE SINGLE HOUND. By Emily Dickinson. With an Introduction by Martha Dickinson Blanchi. Little, Brown & Co. ONE WOMAN TO ANOTHER AND OTHER POEMS. By Corinne Roosevelt Robinson. Charles Scribner’s Sons. $1.25. IN DEEP PLACES. By Amelia Josephine Burr. George H. Doran Company. $1. September 19, 1915, Sunday, Section: Review of Books, Page BR333, 2021 words — — Another Author Lets Loose Over Bad Review Via the Internet —… -
Poetry News For July 1, 2009
30 Jun 2009 | 10:55 pm— A Talk with Sir Rabindranath Tagore; Bengali Poet, Nobel Prize Winner, Now in This Country, Gives His Poetic Creed and Explains Oriental Attitude Toward Literature By Joyce Kilmer. October 29, 1916, Sunday — — Frieda Hughes: why I love motorcycle racing — — The Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in Washington, Mr. Carroll’s hometown, has agreed to install a marker that commemorates a moment on Nov. 27, 1925, when the poet Vachel Lindsay was timidly approached at dinner by a busboy who placed three poems he had written next to Lindsay’s plate. — — This…
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Poet Hound
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Poetry Tips: En Vogue, Too Much, or Not Enough
3 Jul 2009 | 12:05 pmIt occurred to me the other day when an acquaintance bravely asked to read me a poem that was lovely and then related his difficulties in feeling he had too much rhyme and how many times he revised it that brought to mind my own qualms in editing my own poems. Your tip today is to abandon all the imagined critics in your head—the academic critic, the editor-of-a-particular-journal critic, the self-critic, and any other imaginary critic that begins to speak as you begin to revise or revisit your poems. -Whatever poems you come up with for the rest of the week allow them to flow out of you… -
Fragile Arts Quarterly Open Submissions
2 Jul 2009 | 3:56 amFragile Arts Quarterly has not put a moratorium on submissions yet so I believe they are still open to receiving up to 10 poems which you can submit via e-mail to: moongazepubATmywayDOTcom Check out their style and guidelines at: http://fragile-arts-quarterly.blogspot.com/ Good luck to all who submit, please drop in tomorrow for more Poetry Tips… -
Testing....
1 Jul 2009 | 6:47 pmhttp://www.versedaily.org/2009/fracture.shtml “Fracture” by Leslie Adams http://www.shampoopoetry.com/ShampooThirtyfive/rohnert.html “IV By a hair’s breadth” by Jan Volker Rohnhert, translated from German (scroll down) Thanks for clicking in, please stop by tomorrow for more Open Submissions -
Poems Found by Poet Hound
1 Jul 2009 | 3:55 amhttp://www.versedaily.org/fracture.shtml"Fracture" by Leslie Adamshttp://www.shampoopoetry.com/ShampooThirtyfive/rohnert.html"IV by a Hair's Breadth" by Jan Volker Rohnhert, translated from GermanThanks for clicking in...I'm having difficulty with posting now that I've up-dated my web browser so there may be a delay in posts from now on... -
B. Z. Nidith's Boston, Fall and Other Poems
30 Jun 2009 | 3:55 amB. Z. Niditch has been a feature on Poet Hound before, check out my interview with him about his collection called Portraits Here: B. Z. Niditch's PortraitsMr. Niditch’s book, Boston, Fall and Other Poems was published by Encircle Publications, LLC in 2008 and is based out of his experiences in Harvard and places around Massachusetts. The poems are divided into two parts, Part I is titled Harvard Square, Part II is titled Diary. The poems in both sections are beautiful and expressive while encompassing small moments around campus or on the water. Below I will share some small samples:In a…
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LIME TREE
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Craig Dworkin, Parse
3 Jul 2009 | 11:55 amCraig Dworkin's Parse (Atelos, 2008).From the note at the back of the book:Parse is a translation of Edwin A. Abbott's How To Parse: An Attempt to Apply the Principles of Scholarship to English Grammar. First published in 1874, the book played a leading role in the pedagogic debate over whether English should be analyzed as if it were Latin, and thousands of copies were printed as textbooks in the last quarter of the 19th century.When I first came across the book, I was reminded of a confession by Gertrude Stein (another product of 1874): "I really do not know that anything has ever been more… -
July Issue of Poetry Now Online
1 Jul 2009 | 5:10 pmThe All-Flarf, All-Conceptual, and All-Other-Stuff issue of Poetry is now online. -
Wag's Revue 2
26 Jun 2009 | 1:58 pmWag's Revue 2 is now online. It features four of my Sonnagrams, as well as pieces by Kenneth Goldsmith, Gregory Betts, Matthias Svalinas, and others. -
Twilight of the Idols
25 Jun 2009 | 8:03 pm -
Slow and Slower
19 Jun 2009 | 1:34 pmSpecial issue of Big Bridge dedicated to "Slow Poetry" (it's like poetry, only slow).And then there's Even Slower Poetry.
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The Best American Poetry
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Thinking of Taking Fido to the Fireworks? (by Tess Callahan)
3 Jul 2009 | 9:17 pmBecause life is not hectic enough with two kids, three birds, four fish tanks, a teaching job and writing deadlines, I cajoled my poor husband one year ago into adopting a second dog. It started out innocently enough. Since adopting... -
"25 Painters Under 35," with an Intro by John Yau (by David Yezzi)
2 Jul 2009 | 11:42 pmIt's been a while since I've been on the BAP blog. (BAP!: it's like one of those legends that fills the screen when Batman kicks someone in the kisser.) To be honest, Craig Arnold dying kind of took it out... -
Greg Santos presents a Poem by Jason Camlot
2 Jul 2009 | 11:38 pmBorn and raised in the town of Mont Royal, a suburb just north of Montreal, Jason Camlot grew up in the Montreal Anglo-Jewish community, where his father was a furrier manufacturer. Jason started playing music when he was young. He... -
The Creative Process: Painting, Writing, and the Case for Ruthlessness (by Tess Callahan)
2 Jul 2009 | 7:37 pmEven before I began writing, I loved to draw and paint. Although I enjoyed it, I never considered it as a profession. Maybe I was afraid of the impracticality, or like my character, Oliver, (in my novel April & Oliver),... -
Mannequins
2 Jul 2009 | 2:01 pmThese photos, taken in Ithaca by Richard Rand, seemed so suggestive to us, and so evocative of certain noir films of the 1950s, that we thought we would base an informal challenge on them. To wit: write a brief plot...
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Harriet
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A Glass Glass Factory
1 Jul 2009 | 8:05 pmHi again, Harriet! By the way, I’m the media assistant here at the Poetry Foundation. I’ll be posting until the end of the summer, when I’ll leave to begin a PhD program in Comp Lit at Northwestern, where I’ll work on classical and contemporary poetry. When I began taking poetry workshops in college and forming an inkling of what contemporary poetry was up to, one of the books that most excited me was Matthea Harvey’s Pity the Bathtub Its Forced Embrace of the Human Form: not only because I loved its surreal lyric landscapes, but I was dazzled by its use of zeugma, a “yoking”… -
Flarf and Conceptual Writing in Poetry Magazine
1 Jul 2009 | 9:03 amAn introduction to the 21st Century’s most controversial poetry movements. From the July/August 2009 Issue of Poetry Magazine by Kenneth Goldsmith Start making sense. Disjunction is dead. The fragment, which ruled poetry for the past one hundred years, has left the building. Subjectivity, emotion, the body, and desire, as expressed in whole units of plain English with normative syntax, has returned. But not in ways you would imagine . . . READ THE REST HERE. -
Muse-Goddess: A Recessional
30 Jun 2009 | 8:57 pmFor my last post as a Harriet blogger, I wanted to give a shout-out to what makes it work for me. I could say the earth, spirit, guidance, love, chi, or justice— I can see all these as names for what I understand as the goddess, an immanent (not transcendent) spiritual principle, who gets me out of bed in the morning and keeps me reading, writing, loving, and thinking about poems. At first I wasn’t sure how, whether, or why to write this post, because it is not a comfortable subject. There are many stigmas attached to any kind of spirituality now, and pagan/earth/goddess-centered… -
The Fish, II (following a recent post by Camille Dungy)
30 Jun 2009 | 4:22 pmGabriel Metsu – “Maid Broiling Fish”, mid 17th century, Flemish Gary Winogrand, one of America’s greatest street photographers, working in the tradition (or rather reworking the tradition) of Henri Cartier-Bresson, said that he was not interested in reality, per se, but what it looked like in a photograph. Camille’s passionate reading of a Bishop poem recently allowed me to make a connection I would have otherwise never made. Or at least that is what I assume, or I probably would have already made it. But, it was Camille’s picture of the poem, her version, what she highlighted and… -
A Post of Posts
30 Jun 2009 | 12:23 amI have only one day left on Harriet (though they have asked we who are leaving to keep posting occasionally, and I will look forward to that). I’ve been rationing posts, but I’ve nearly run out. There were a lot gestating. One about food poetry. One about finishing the ms. of a book that includes pretty much everything I’ve ever learned about how to write poetry, and that strange tome-like closure. One about how learning Anglo-Saxon changed my life long ago. One called “What I Have Learned from Susun Weed” about my time with this herbalist, and the amazing things she teaches, and a…
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One Poet's Notes
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Bruce Springsteen sings Bob Dylan's "Chimes of Freedom" in East Berlin
3 Jul 2009 | 8:30 amIn the city’s melted furnace, unexpectedly we watched With faces hidden while the walls were tightening . . .And we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing.On this Independence Day weekend, the above video appears to offer an appropriate blend of political poignancy and human celebration of a need for freedom: Bruce Springsteen sings Bob Dylan’s “Chimes of Freedom” at a concert in East Berlin during July of 1988, a year before the Berlin Wall crumbled twenty years ago in November of 1989.As the camera pans a crowd of nearly 200,000 East Berlin citizens dancing, clapping, and… -
Joey Nicoletti: "The Cook-Out"
29 Jun 2009 | 10:06 pmThe VPR Poem of the Week is Joey Nicoletti’s “The Cook-Out,” which appeared in the Fall/Winter 2005-2006 issue (Volume VII, Number 1) of Valparaiso Poetry Review.Joey Nicoletti teaches at Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville and has had poetry published in various magazines, including Gulf Stream, Italian Americana, The Potomac, Puerto del Sol, Southwestern American Literature, and others.Tuesday of each week “One Poet’s Notes” highlights an excellent work by a poet selected from the archives of Valparaiso Poetry Review, except when other posts with news or updates preempt… -
An Elegant Epigraph: Frank O'Hara on Writing About Experience
26 Jun 2009 | 10:21 pmFrank O’Hara celebrated his birth as this date (June 27) in 1926. [Readers should note recent recovery of records indicates he actually may have been born on March 27, 1926.] When asked by Donald Allen to provide a preface for his poems in the New American Poetry anthology published in 1960, O’Hara at first supplied his now well-known “manifesto” on “Personism.” However, Allen determined the submitted essay did not suit the tenor of the anthology; therefore, O’Hara substituted a shorter prose piece. Although not as famous as O’Hara’s explanation of “Personism,” which… -
Claire Bateman: "Flight Path"
22 Jun 2009 | 10:08 pmThe VPR Poem of the Week is Claire Bateman’s “Flight Path,” which appeared in the Spring/Summer 2006 issue (Volume VII, Number 2) of Valparaiso Poetry Review.Claire Bateman’s collections of poetry are Leap (New Issues Press, 2005), Clumsy (New Issues Press, 2003), At the Funeral of the Ether (Ninety-Six Press, 1998), Friction (Eighth Mountain Press, 1998), and The Bicycle Slow Race (Wesleyan University Press, 1993). Her poems also have appeared in various anthologies—such as The Wesleyan Tradition (Wesleyan University Press, 1991) and The Kenyon Poets (Kenyon Review, 1989)—as well… -
Paul Muldoon with Stephen Colbert
21 Jun 2009 | 10:25 pmThe Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30cPaul Muldoonwww.colbertnation.comColbert Report Full EpisodesPolitical HumorStephen Colbert in IraqEnjoy a little bit of literary humor to start the summer season.
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Poetic Asides
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PAD Challenge Update!
2 Jul 2009 | 3:46 pmThe title is a little misleading, because the update is that there is no update. In fact, I was hoping to make all announcements related to the April PAD Challenge 2009 today, but so-so-so-so much got in the way since the end of April (both personal and work related). However, I am making great progress on the Top 5 lists for each day, and I'm fairly certain I know who will be named this year's Poetic Asides Poet Laureate. So, let's shoot for early-August as when we'll know who (and how many) completed the challenge; who made it into the e-book; who made the Top 5 list for each day; who is… -
Wednesday Poetry Prompts: 051
1 Jul 2009 | 10:52 amSorry for the late start this morning; I went for an early morning run, had a couple meetings, and yadda-yadda-yadda, here it is the early afternoon. Oh well, sometimes it's good to get off to a late start, right? For this week's prompt, I want you to write a poem that has the title "Nobody's worth (blank)" in which you replace the (blank) with a word or phrase. For instance, you could have the following titles: "Nobody's worth a nickel;" "Nobody's worth that kind of headache;" or "Nobody's worth missing the Ohio State-Michigan game." Here's my attempt for the day:… -
What's a good poetic summer read?
25 Jun 2009 | 6:01 amChuck Sambuchino, editor of Guide to Literary Agents and Screenwriter's & Playwright's Market, ran into Ted Kooser (former National Poet Laureate) at a writing conference (Chuck travels more than any editor I know). So Chuck had Ted sign a copy of The Blizzard Voices for me as a get well gift (from my May health scare). Anyway, the book was a very fun read. Since it had to do with the Blizzard of 1888, it was a nice escape from the Heat Wave of 2009. Perfect poetic summer reading material? This got me wondering if you have any poetic summer reading suggestions? If so, share with the group in… -
Where you can find me (besides this awesome blog, of course)
24 Jun 2009 | 2:05 pmHere are some of my various links (in case you want to friend me, sign up for a free newsletter, or whatever): Facebook profile facebook.com/robertleebrewer Twitter profile twitter.com/robertleebrewer Plus, I have a profile at linkedin.com I edit Writer's Market and WritersMarket.com (where you can also sign up for a free newsletter--edited by me) I edit Poet's Market and the Poet's Market newsletter (which also has a free sign up) -
Wednesday Poetry Prompts: 050
24 Jun 2009 | 5:46 amSince it's the first prompt of summer (at least in the Northern Hemisphere), let's write a summer poem. You can write about a summer activity, summer heat, summer flowers, or summer whatever. Here is my attempt for the day: "Summer Song" The fireflies rise out of the grass as the sun fades into the west and the cars' headlights shine through glass to ward off the threat of a crash. Watch for wayward deer up ahead where fireflies rise out of the grass and other creatures sometimes pass like wandering souls of the dead as the cars' headlights float by fast. If a witch, then a spell to cast…
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Chris Weige
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Rambo and Rimbaud
26 Jun 2009 | 5:53 pmvia flickr.com via The Joseph Boys Posted via web from Reckon -
Is Everybody In?
26 Jun 2009 | 5:53 pmvia youtube.com via http://twitter.com/pareidoliac Posted via web from Reckon -
Mark Twain Soda Machine
26 Jun 2009 | 4:25 pmvia flickr.com Hannibal, Missouri via Chicago Man’s flickr Posted via web from Reckon -
Astarte Psychedelic Ballet
26 Jun 2009 | 11:05 amvia thenonist.com In 1967 a ballet came to the stage which became an absolute sensation. It was called Astarte, after a naked semitic Goddess of fertility, sexuality, and war, who’d eventually be absorbed by the Greeks under the name Aphrodite. Choreographed and directed by one Robert Joffrey it was considered groundbreaking in its staging and it remains the only ballet to ever grace the cover of Time magazine. via the nonist (more here) photo: herb migdoll Posted via web from Reckon -
Story of the Eye
26 Jun 2009 | 11:05 amHistoire de l’oeil - Story of the Eye - Georges Bataille Music by Gato Barbieri Film by Javier Mayoral via ronpolla Posted via email from Reckon
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Poetry Freedom
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The Truth Has Been Spoken
3 Jul 2009 | 1:05 pmSo I may not be the most attractive man But the man within me is attractive Maybe if you stick around long enough Then you will see that I can be interactive I usually very shy And I don’t talk too much There is no particular reason why It’s just that when I speak I get stuck Most of the time I lay [...] -
Unbreakable
26 Jun 2009 | 11:53 amYou say I’m ugly But you’re looking at my pictures You say you’re my friend But you talk behind my back You like my style But you say it’s wack People say that I’m gay But girls like to be around me I can’t help it If my personality is astounding People say that I bring the rain But they bring me the sun Because their hatred Is [...] -
From Lonely To Happy
18 Jun 2009 | 10:07 pmAs she walks down the dark and dusty road Her life has yet to unfold She is a very lonely girl In a very lonely world Constantly asking questions But never getting the answers However she knows that she is not destined To live like this forever She is a social outcast And nobody ever talks to her Because in the past Everybody thought she was [...] -
A lone crow
15 Jun 2009 | 7:25 pmA lone crow A lone crow gets tired of flying and lands on a tree. Dead and decaying, it shakes its sole remaining bough in a vain attempt to steady itself. The crow flaps its wings and repositions itself, but it can’t get comfortable. The lone crow, tired of flying, spreads its wings and takes flight again, in search of a more peaceful rest. 16 June 2009 Written at my windowsill St. [...] -
A list
14 Jun 2009 | 11:47 amA list I’ve never kept a list of things I hope to accomplish before I reach the age of twenty-four. I never understood why I should look back at a wish uncompleted and feel shame, more and more. The embarrassment of being a failure I don’t need. Feelings of regret just get in the way. Why is this list of desires something [...]
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Dunstan Carter - Poetry
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Bruising
1 Jul 2009 | 12:48 pmThe sun disappears As clouds punch hillsides with glee We are the bruising Poetry.net -
In the Blue Room
24 Jun 2009 | 8:49 amIn the blue room The worries gather, The walking memories, The groan of time, The no sleep And the cancerous birdsong, When blue breaks It’s yellow I’ll fall, Till then the joke’s yet to split, I’m unfit for these trials But I’m conscious and stubborn Like the smile of a boxer Bent over the ropes, A hand of hope Stretching All blue and disfigured. Poetry.net -
Here Now
17 Jun 2009 | 4:46 pmThe mirrors to the future, Electrified turnabouts And the fall of summer leaves, The past dreams of a mantlepiece, Ornaments all cracked And the gathering of dust, Here now and smiling, A reason for clinging on tightly And the moment it all somehow changed. Poetry.net -
All the Trees Bend
12 Jun 2009 | 5:18 pmStitched loose above fields The sky drops its nonchalence And all the trees bend Poetry.net -
There Are Ghosts Here Now
4 Jun 2009 | 1:24 pmThere are ghosts here now, The sounds of phantom engines Drawing up outside my home, The smell of your skin on my linen, Your reflection in the clock face, Your love in all my tears. Time was I knew what instinct meant, Counting new birds in the sky And resting on predictions Of when I’d next see your smile, But there are ghosts here now, A hollow born from sorrow, An amplified silence on weekends, Something new in the wastes of this city, The punches of inevitable endings, Your outline all blurred in the distance. Poetry.net
