There's something about a good author photo that helps sell a book. Like it or not, I know my decisions at the bookstore, involve, in whatever minimal way, a quick face- and blurbcheck as I pick up a book of poetry for the first time. Who can resist the quick flip to scan the blurbs on a back cover before opening the book? I've read of judges of poetry contests who not only mask the names of entrants but who also refuse to look at the front and back covers of a book, in an effort at objectivity. Book covers with their author photos, blurbs, and in their general design, grab the interest and provide some brief context before taking the plunge. Which is the coolest author photo here? Hands down -- Ralph Ellison. (Blaise Cendrars, Jack Kerouac, Michelle Cahill, Umberto Eco)

The Forest of Did

Meet in the Forest of Did
and at the appropriate hour, see.

The heels of our shoes were coated
with algorithms, and our tongues wagged.

In one of our conversations I note
that you are very beautiful for a human.

I’m no longer operating that anyone.
These leaves know time each night.

Even with lime eyes, I’m still
able to recognize what sarcasm.

You may not know about the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) legislation that was recently passed in Congress. The Act grants immunity to telecommunications companies (telecoms) regarding retroactive lawsuits. Because it was recently discovered that large telecommunications companies (e.g., AT&T, Comcast, T-Mobile, Verizon) have been spying on average Americans by turning over documentation of their phone and Internet habits, lawsuits were filed by those whose records were stolen—but because of new FISA legislation those lawsuits have been taken off the docket.

FISA in its current state is similar to measures that were championed by Vice President Cheney immediately after the events of 9/11.

In fact, FISA is a clear violation of the Fourth Amendment.
________________

U.S. Constitution: Fourth Amendment --The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

________________

Without probable cause, FISA enables “government agencies” (a term that is so broad it’s nearly meaningless) with the help of telecoms to record phone conversations, text message exchanges, and e-mail exchanges without a warrant (which effectively eliminates the Judicial branch of our government from the process—a crucial checks-and-balances step in the process that limits the power of the Executive branch and provides necessary oversight). The very foundation of our democracy is built upon the premise that none are above the law.

In fact, the passage of FISA has much more to do with shielding the telecoms from lawsuits and less to do with stopping terrorism. At issue is the idea of securing warrants. Under the previous FISA legislation, which was passed in the 1970s, a warrant was necessary before law enforcement could view information such as e-mails or listen in to phone conversations. The process of obtaining a warrant for such purposes had been streamlined after the events of 9/11 considerably. In many cases, most observers had stated that a warrant under the old version of FISA could have been procured within 24 hours. If the surveillance that occurred prior to the decision to obtain a warrant was successful there would be no reason to believe that obtaining the warrant and waiting an additional 24 hours would present a problem. It’s been proven by intelligence agencies worldwide that any terrorist event on par with the events of 9/11 would take years to plan and stage, giving authorities ample time to detect the activities of terrorists and thwart their plans. FISA allows government agencies, at the behest of the Exective branch, to conduct searches with the help of the telecoms without judicial oversight. Essentially this makes law enforcement judge and jury, which is contrary to the principles on which the United States was founded. Imagine a situation whereby it is legal for law enforcement officials to enter your home unannounced and without a warrant. FISA enables a search of your virtual “home.” Not only are your communications with others fair game but also other vital information held on your computer or in your phone. Purchase histories, social security numbers, credit histories, medical histories, and other types of information can now be brought in with the FISA net without your knowledge. This information can now be shared with others without your knowledge. Those who defend FISA, or who would like to see even broader legislation, counter the defenders of the Fourth Amendment with scurrilous accusations meant to call into question one’s patriotism. But those who defend FISA without a critical eye are ignoring history. As Lord Acton said, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” The Founding Fathers of the United States knew that oversight, or checks-and-balances, was the only stopgap against the type of corruption that turns public servants into despots.

The fear marketing used by the Bush Administration to advance their agenda has worked. Bush’s time in office has been marked by an aggressive push to increase the power of the Executive and the FISA legislation recently passed is another step in that direction. Most nations on earth do not enjoy the civil liberties that we take for granted. Even most highly industrialized nations in this technological age do not hold the idea of the rule of law dear.

“…an unprecedented campaign (Strange Bedfellows) [began] Tuesday to hold Democratic lawmakers accountable for caving in to the Bush administration on domestic spying. A group of high-profile progressives and libertarian Republicans are rolling out a new political action committee called Accountability Now to channel widespread anger over pending legislation (FISA) that would legalize much of the president's warrantless electronic surveillance of Americans, and grant retroactive legal immunity to telephone companies that cooperated with the spying when it was still illegal.” —Providence Journal


Barack Obama’s recent vote for passing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) after it was revised is being called a cave-in by the far left and merely a compromise by others. Obama can’t be viewed as soft on national defense if he wishes to succeed in his bid for the presidency and this is a step in that direction. I hope that he follows through on his claim to provide the kind of oversight necessary to keep FISA legitimate. Throughout American history, politicians on both sides of the aisle have used various forms of domestic spying as a tool to advance their agendas. That’s why recent FISA legislation is such a loss for average Americans. FISA proponents have sold it as a vote for the fight against terrorism when the existing legislation wasn’t in true need of an overhaul. The new FISA legislation opens the floodgates to every kind of potential violation of privacy.

The true danger of wiretapping lies in its lure of invisibility. Bush’s version of FISA places the telecoms above the law.

And some of this makes me think of one of the best British TV shows ever—The Prisoner. Not just because Patrick McGoohan drove a Lotus Seven, but because of the kooky dialog and the swinging Sixties sets.

Just don’t be surprised if someday you are asked for “information.” [Where am I? In “the village.” What do you want? Information. ]

Philip Metres just turned 38 and so did I, so I was glad to find his entry from a few days ago about Leaves of Grass. I do the same thing—bring out Leaves of Grass to read occasionally to help commemorate milestones or else to just enjoy how my response to the book changes over the years. I can’t think of a book that’s more American. After finding this article on Silliman’s blog, I had to write something. Is Leaves more of a question or an answer? Can it be both? Leaves of Grass evokes some sense of inspired awareness, but not a simplistic religious pluralism. It isn’t that Whitman calls for us to worship what is around us, but he does make the case for a spirituality that hinges on our awareness of the interrelatedness of ourselves and our surroundings. Does a greater awareness mean greater freedom? Or is a heightened awareness of ourselves and the world we live in just another, albeit more elaborate, illusion? At its core the book celebrates existence in a way that hasn’t been seen since. I don’t see Walt Whitman as a prophet necessarily (but if anyone else does, I do agree he wore it well and suffered a bit from vanity but what poet doesn’t), but he points the way to what might be the only way to truly exit the modern condition. In the mid 1950s Jean-Paul Sartre (in the play "No Exit" I believe) formulated an opposite perspective and even went so far as to famously exclaim “hell is other people,” but Leaves of Grass conquers its literary “competition” through quiet persistence. It seems to just get better with age. Whitman reworked Leaves tirelessly. The book went through eleven successive editions until the time of Whitman's death in 1892, by which time 283 poems had been added. Jim Morrison once proclaimed himself an "erotic politician" but I think that applies more to Walt Whitman. There's more sex in Leaves of Grass than nearly any other book in the American literary canon, but Whitman takes us there through his spirituality. It's dangerous and still just really, really good.

Let me not to the marrow squash of true mine fields
Admit imperialism. Love is not love
Which alters when it alternative medicine finds,
Or bends with the recounter to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed marketer
That looks on temptation and is never shaken;
It is the star-chamber to every wandering barley,
Whose wraith’s unknown, although his heirloom be taken.
Love's not timeshare’s fool, though rosy lipoprotein and chefs
Within his bending sickness’s compendium come:
Love alters not with his brief houseboat and weeping willow,
But bears it out even to the edge of door knobs.
If this be erysipelas and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no managing editor ever loved.

____________

I occasionally like to perform the Oulipian N+7 routine on canonical poems as my own personal seventh-inning stretch. The ingenious methods of the Oulipans (of which Raymond Queneau famously said—“Oulipans: rats who build the labyrinth from which they plan to escape.") become apparent only in the process of applying their constraints. Shakespeare can become something entirely now: instead of the assignment or chore it is to many. I sent my Oulipian constraint, the "witch hunt," to Harry Mathews , who commented that it made sense in theory but he'd need to see it in practice. I'm still working on it. Plus, I get to include the history of the seventh-inning stretch, according to Wikipedia anyway. That's Queneau at the photomat having some fun.


“The origin of the seventh inning stretch is the story of Brother Jasper of Mary, F.S.C., the man credited with bringing baseball to Manhattan College in the late 1800s. Being the Prefect of Discipline as well as the coach of the team, it fell to Brother Jasper to supervise the student fans at every home game. On one particularly hot and muggy day in 1882, during the seventh inning against a semi-pro team called the Metropolitans, the Prefect noticed his charges becoming restless. To break the tension, he called a time-out in the game and instructed everyone in the bleachers to stand up and unwind. It worked so well he began calling for a seventh-inning rest period at every game. The Manhattan College custom spread to the major leagues after the New York Giants were charmed by it at an exhibition game, and the rest is history.” —Wikipedia

My chapbook Disharmonium is now available at the Silver Wonder Press Web site. Sometimes I look in the rearview mirror and think about the many poems I've written and why. I never felt as though writing poetry was a choice on my part. I remember first reading poets such as Ed Sanders, Clayton Eshleman, Blaise Cendrars, Arthur Rimbaud, Emily Dickinson, Gregory Corso, Harry Matthews, Aram Saroyan, Anne Sexton, Ted Berrigan, Guillaume Apollinaire, and others and thinking "that's who I am," not "that's what I want to do." The daily struggle of rewriting a poem only to leave it in frustration, perhaps coming back to it on another day, is what I know to be the writing life--if there is one. Some come fully formed from an overheard conversation, or a half-remembered dream, and some bubble up from the memory as if they can no longer exist in the deeper imagination and must either exist on the page as something separate from me, or they disappear and are replaced by other ideas. Poetry has allowed me to meet myself halfway and try to define what I find there. When I look in the rearview mirror I don't see the Atomium in Brussels, but it makes a good photo. Thanks for listening.

I'll be reading a section of the novel On the Road, Wednesday, November 5th at Columbia College .

Time: 8:00 pm
Place: Columbia College,
Conaway Center, 1104 S. Wabash
Chicago

Babel Fruit

Thanks to Ren Powell for inclusion of some work from my new chapbook Disharmonium at Babel Fruit.

What softening deep

stews night

hears the invi-
tation of the rain
in dust-bin mind:


climbs your
hindsight: reclines there


(inside the ear.

I sleep then eat details

first person is served in New York
not in Chicago, we sigh
high on the loveliness of time,
the way it billows
purling, streets
deep as Lethe,

fields of concrete
with quests,
occasional cops
who gallop by

lights singing
the street is a
June thesis on ease.

Like Woody Allen
in Bananas, I want
1,000 deli sandwiches
chips no fries though
at Billy Goat.

Traipsing Western
later we use the
aleph* to scan
all directions simultaneously
on the lookout
for stray poets.

Ed Dorn’s Illinois,
lag and sway
drunk on summer
er days.
I’d like to live to
70, too, I guess.

______________



*Aleph or Alef, is the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet and the number 1 in Hebrew. Its esoteric meaning in Judaic Kabbalah, as denoted in the theological treaty Sefer-ha-Bahir, relates to the origin of the universe, the "primordial one that contains all numbers".

I'll be performing at Brown Rice with Daniel Godston (pictured) on Monday, July 21.

Time:
To be announced.
Location:
4432 N Kedzie Ave
Chicago IL 60625

I'll be one of the featured readers at Brothers K coffeehouse, at Main and Hinman in Evanston on November 21 at 6:30pm. Come out to hear some of my new poetry.

Talisman

There you will glimpse the portal to the self and cherish it. Your excuses were nailed to a tree then resurrected.

You well know about my penchant for dismay. This night is a lamp in the moon.

The doors of autumn are rusting. What miracle plays hide-and-seek with the afternoon?


__________________


She walks half-mad statues. A thick smoke of reckoning collides against her sky. Where he’d lost it.

Close the ghostly curtains of dimes.

Every tremor in the sea is an exploration of eternity.

You left your heart at the theater and never went back for it.

Scenes from summer, like a frieze. A reef of pillows lines the bed.

Solemn hour of newborns, birds insult the air. My lust is a picturesque pier.

How to describe a life’s cleavage? There is a silly hymn called ecstasy with white, aquatic eyes.


__________________



There are bridges in my pores and blades in my blood.

The legendary beauty is a transparency of the first magnitude. Of circular robes and occasional stars.

Blueish is the sky of artifice above the ruins of history.

Scissor arpeggios from your favorite song. Tread water in his memory.

Lunch on Time's jambalaya.

Nobody is sleeping in the sky

—after Lorca


Foist the molten day
upward into surf and let it
drown there, in the greenest
eye. Shine the moon, so
due for cleaning.

Let's liaison in the fire.

8 Wikipedos

Elena Yevgenyevna Dostay,
the Russian archer,
shot not arrows
but Freedom.



My woebeg-one
what have you d-one,
like a country s-ong
about an archeoastronomer.



Hey you, why not try
latent semantic analysis?
Just the sandwich,
not the meal.



The secret cheese that
powers Hollywood
comes in two varieties,
blockbuster and huh.



Tom Clancy, your
Debt of Honor—
stop writing
prosthetic fiction.



Footballer Hugo Gatti
nicknamed “El Loco”
was known for achique
& plain weirdness.



Shibata Zeshin
did nothing much to
stand out from
his contemporaries.




Bronx martyr
last of the Mo-ricans,
Carlito Brigante
in Carlito’s Way.





Österdalälven,
future sports drink
& also beautiful
river in Sweden.



______________________________
Wikipedo : Term coined by the author to describe a new type of poetry written using the “random article” feature on Wikipedia, our modern-day equivalent to the oracle at Delphi. Short poems meant to be written, and forgotten, as quickly as possible.

Nice to be included in this collage with such good company. This image is from the Here Comes Everybody blog--a great resource filled with many interesting interviews. Too bad that the print version was sidelined due to copyright disagreements among the interviewees.

I'm working on a series of ekphrastic poems with the photographer Jelena Glazova. This is the second in the series. The photo is an image of a woman dancing -- blurred. It's interesting as I write these that they begin based in the image and then find their own path of associations, without much of an explicit meaning --

________________

This is a melody, composed of flesh,
that shreds each moment of specificity.
But North of what nowhere is this night?
What cavern inside us did we mine of dream?
What guides the lips that dine upon our
minds? Eaten to ward off superstition,
our fingers visited the origin of myth—
transfixed. A limousine or shadow calls
to us to dance like gristle, incognito.
Your tongue pronounces whims
uncontrollable (as through our lives we fell).
Blurred bones twist like wan guitars
in the mists of transparent speech. Yes, you
are out of reach. I orchid against you, are
you listening, but tropic climes deride us.
Train your eyes to quit their leash.

Dance

in the brambles
of the mind
there
to
a
soft gathering
we go

but of our
lapses
and
what shore-
line at the
edge of
sight

this, a
moment upon
which we

To the Nearly Living

I am summoned from my bed
to the ancient city of the dead



Over the archway
to the doorway
we float upon a myth.
Howling toad called race,
disappear in the assurance of immortality.
Stricken match called consciousness,
cool yourself upon the coals
that this knowledge of our similar teeth
allows us all to eat the same caves.

Favola

There are lives awaiting bread
An empty village in the sun
Knowledge has a face
The water takes her time

There is a gift inside your eyes
There is a mirror in the breeze
A quick philosophy to stones
The water takes her time

There is a luster to the earth
And an echo in the vine
There is such envy in the clouds
The water takes her time.

Metropolis

As heretical coat hanger
looks like Michael Jordan
summer of was and slushies
shudders in the early stages
I can’t believe you brain-
checked Madonna but look
la belle dame sans merci
faints accordingly at the Met
zilch version diabolized
thanks your moral authority for
another ukulele election night
basic needs go unmet but
city poignant weird big
middle finger glowing
Ross and Chandler implode
$2,300 is cheap for a brutish
erstwhile facsimile else
we quarter each other and,
cues blazing, become
lifeless bulldozers at O.K. Corral.
Lights, or fists, awaken.

It's surprising -- reading a Guardian article and finding they've linked their Philip Lamantia reference to a page on milkmag.org.

Chicago Tribune - Printers' Row Book Fair
@ Dearborn & Polk

Sunday, June 8
Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Stage
From 12:30 - 6:00 pm / Maxine Kumin, Li-Young Lee, Sonya Arko, Margaret Brady, Esteban Colon, Larry O. Dean, Kristin LaTour, Toni Asante Lightfoot, Patricia McMillen, Erika Mikkalo, Raul Nino, Ron Offen, Donna Pecore and Larry Sawyer.

I'm last in the lineup and understand that we're closing the show.

Invitation

Ether of calm
in the summer’s soft
yolk, I’ve known shadows
and freshly killed customs
walked among panthers and seasons.
I’ve known hope
its idiot coals
and followed their rivals
those dark wicker jackals.

Stood among years
in a fringe of
nervy lightning -
constructed worlds
from the tea of
that dissonance.
I’ve launched ribbons
too ripe for sleeping,
split rotten gardens
and slept conveniently inside.

Seriously

Shelf of islands, my books are antennae.
Let the movies turn your topsoil.
Insects and endorphins allow grief
and wings for every eye drawer, as
often I strip the preening lamp of strays
and fence the morning from its doves.
What beautiful ocean still hums and lies?
What calendar pours all our days?
Seize for me the viscous world and
juice again a summer's sun.

Myopic Books Poetry Series

All readings at Myopic begin at 7 pm.







Location:
1564 N. Milwaukee Ave
Chicago, IL 60622

Contact:
773.862.4882

Schedule:
Sunday, May 25 - Hadara Bar-Nadav & Ray Bianchi
Sunday, June 1 - Jennifer Karmin, Amina Cain, & special guests
Sunday, June 8 - Garin Cycholl & Juan Manuel Sanchez
Sunday, June 22 - Abraham Smith & Steve Timm
Sunday, September 21 - Mark Yakich
Sunday, October 12 - Michael Rothenberg & David Meltzer (in conjunction
with the Poetry Center of Chicago)
Sunday, October 19 - Brenda Iijima

If you're interested in hearing some of my work, I'll be reading my poetry on Sunday, June 8, as part of the Printers' Row Book Fair. I'm looking forward to hearing Augusten Burroughs.

When: 4-6 pm
Where: Chicago Tribune, Printers' Row Book Fair, Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Tent

Bill Berkson Reading @ Myopic Books, Sunday May 18

Don't miss Bill Berkson and Philip Metres reading at Myopic Books this weekend.

All readings begin at 7pm.

Myopic Books
1564 N. Milwaukee Ave
Chicago, IL 60622

Disharmonium, a new chapbook, is forthcoming from Silver Wonder Press with cover by Amy Evans McClure.

Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz calculates that the war in Iraq is costing Americans $25 billion each month and is tied to the nation’s current economic crisis.

This is the war that was described as a "mission accomplished" by George W. Bush, who has also said that Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with the attacks of 9/11.

RIP Aimé Césaire (1913-2008)

As the White House prepares to host the Dalai Lama, I started to wonder what the result of that meeting might be. No one right now can think of the Dalai Lama, without thinking of the Chinese government. I think it’s horrible that China is hosting the Olympic games. Like any other scenario involving politics, the
Dalai Lama’s visit is primarily symbolic. But because the Chinese government is ridiculously sensitive whenever their track record of criminal infringement on human rights is brought into the light, they take the Dalai Lama’s visit to the United States as an insult. Governments that lock up citizens without hesitation for assembling, speaking out against human rights violations, and that generally advocate a complete disregard for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness typically don’t act so shocked when they are criticized for doing so. These types of governments usually level similar criticisms against their critics as a defensive measure, but Chinese officials opt to feign surprise and make statements of bewilderment when anyone points up the fact that they are evil.

How many would truly enjoy watching the Olympics if they knew that construction of the Olympics site was the result of forced relocations?

China is one of the world’s oldest civilizations, and I state clearly that a criticism of communist China’s government is not a criticism against the Chinese people. This is the nation that in a bygone era invented paper, the compass, gunpowder, and printing.

It’s important to ask “which China?” when discussing contemporary China too, because it’s a land of so many different peoples. But according to a Web site run by the Chinese government everything is fine. They will deal with the “Tibet problem” by simply locking up anyone who questions. There are now reports that the Chinese government has threatened the lives of lawyers who wish to represent Tibetans accused of acts of vandalism. This is the country that manufactures a sizeable portion of nearly every product that Americans buy. Most will be blind to these facts when confronted by the spectacle of the Olympics. China would have us believe that they are similar to other nations who favor government by the people and who respect the rule of law, but China is very different. The Olympics in Beijing in August is China’s opportunity to show the world that what they’re doing is ok. The Chinese method of governing people is far from ok. In what can only be described as an item for the “huh?’ department, the tagline for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing is “One world, one dream.” I have to wonder what, or whose, dream is being promoted because torture and imprisonment is more correctly referred to as the stuff of nightmare.

Here's another source for lists. I can't vouch for all of them, because I only had a chance to skim, but they seem worth a glance.

Also Simon DeDeo reviews the latest Myopic Books reading.

I'm still thinking of lists, so I'll add my list of the day.

_______________________

Top 10 Worst Book Titles, Descending Order

10. Globalization: The Golden Years
9. A Brief History of the Panty
8. The Birdwatcher’s Guide to Killing Lots of, Well, Birds
7. People Really, Really Like Me: A Concise Macroeconomics of Arrogance (Fully Illustrated and Newly Expanded Know-it-All Edition)
6. Earn Extra Income with that Back Hoe Now, or Later
5. Jackanapes Abroad: Tips Every U.S. Embassy Staffer Should Know
4. Dick Cheney’s Really Just a Big Sweetie
3. Kiss Your Ass Goodbye: A History of Mining in America
2. Win at Chess (by Creating a Diversion While Losing at Chess)
1. Uzbekistan: Feel the Magic

What We've Had so Far

"Gathering Threat"

"Axis of Evil"

"Slam Dunk"

"Shock and Awe"

"Mission Accomplished"

"Last Throes"

"Adapt to Win"

"Stay the Course"

"New Way Forward"

"The Surge"

"The Pause"

_________________________________________________
I thought I'd post this as a found poem, but it's also a list. These are the catch-phrases that the Bush administration has used to describe the situation in Iraq, in the order of their appearance. "The Pause" is the most recent strategy being promoted.

“Motivated by a force that is vocalized but not wholly comprehensible, the lyric insists on being heard in spite of the fact that it cannot make itself fit conventional codes of meaning. To whatever extent it employs everyday discourse—and even the more esoteric discourses of politics or religion—its aim is to point outside any accountable meaning, to provoke the reception of an excess of meaning. ‘Lyric’ does not suggest an inattention to the material aspects of language or to the possibility of double voicing by which works of art can critique their own formulations.” From Elizabeth Willis's essay "The Arena in the Garden: Some Thoughts on the Late Lyric” in Telling it Slant: Avant-Garde Poetics of the 1990s. Ed. Mark Wallace and Steven Marks. University of Alabama Press, 2002.

_________________________________
I've always liked this quote. Some of the more interesting contemporary lyric poetry "cannot make itself fit conventional codes of meaning" but also plays off the readers expectations of what these codes might mean. Diaristic, or personal narrative poetry, that isn't critical of first person, or self-referential in some occasional ironic way, has always been problematic for me, or else just boring.

Louise Glück comes to mind as a poet that falls into this "hugely boring" category. Helen Vendler notes that Glück’s poems invite the reader’s participation by asking us to “fill out the story, substitute ourselves for the fictive personages, invent a scenario from which the speaker can solve the allegory. . .” But it's this kind of pseudo-psychological agreement with the audience that convinces me that those who gravitate to this kind of poetry should really be reading a novel. "Inventing a scenario" is not similar to the "willing suspension of disbelief" required of reading poetry that presents a challenge to the imagination. It's just a sign of banal writing.

The List Poem

In the list poem the poet, or writer, in a very Duchampian way drags the reader into making certain associations based on the context provided by the list.

Marcel Duchamp, by placing a hat rack on a string and hanging it from the ceiling took an object and rechristened it as something else entirely, an activity at which he excelled. It’s easy to see when looking up that the wooden hat rack, suspended, has taken on a life of its own. Duchamp was the source of so many artistic currents it’s difficult to keep track, but that would make a good list. His 1936 “Coeurs Volants,” for example prefigured Op Art by decades.

List poems hang from a contextual ceiling of sorts and, taken together as a group, these disparate items sometimes have an unpretentiousness to them that’s really unique because they exist minus all the aesthetic baggage of the typical poem. The only rules are that there are no “rules” to writing a good list. I guess the structure should exist as a numbered, vertical series versus a list separated by punctuation written as a paragraph only because that could be misconstrued as a catalog. Rhyme can sometimes hold a list together, or not, and it sometimes helps for the list to either ascend or descend into a culmination of some topic or else to devolve into near chaos, so that it’s understood why the ultimate item belongs there and nowhere else on the list. The pressure to provide some gradation as the list progresses can lead to either laughs or a rejection of the list, because it’s nearly impossible to read an effective list without judging the list against a mental tally of what the reader supposes is the “real” or more authentic order, based on his or her own experiences and preferences. Examples include James Tate's "The List of Famous Hats" and Ted Berrigan's "Ten Things I do Every Day." Christopher Smart’s “Jubilate Agno” was written between 1758 and 1763, largely while Smart bided his time in a madhouse. “Jubilate Agno” is only a list in the sense that nearly all the lines begin with “For” or “Let.” And where else could we find one of the best lines of poetry in existence?

Tho' toad I am the object of man's hate.
Yet better am I than a reprobate, who has the worst of prospects.

Other examples include James Tate's "The List of Famous Hats" and Ted Berrigan's "Ten Things I Do Every Day." Listverse.com is a good source of lists, but not necessarily list poems, serious or otherwise. Send me a list poem as a comment and I’ll put it up.

Here’s one from Listverse.com

Top Ten Books that Changed America
10. Leaves of Grass
9. The Clansman
8. The Grapes of Wrath
7. The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
6. Silent Spring
5. Native Son
4. A Vindication of the Rights of Women
3. The Jungle
2. Uncle Tom’s Cabin
1. Common Sense

This top top ten all-time rock performances is complete with You Tube clips, which is a nice touch, although The Ramones playing “Commando” on any given night at CBGBs in the late 70s should be included, or Bob Dylan playing “Maggie’s Farm” at Newport. My top ten rock/jazz/reggae moments?

10. Lou Reed, Chicago, IL (Navy Pier)
9. Brainiac, Dayton, OH (Canal Street Tavern)
8. Samla Mammas Manna, Chicago, IL (Schubas)
7. Kiss, Dayton, OH (Hara Arena)
6. Beenie Man, Negril, Jamaica (Bourbon Beach)
5. Elvis Costello, Chicago, IL (Grant Park)
4. Pharoah Sanders, Chicago, IL (Jazz Showcase)
3. English Beat, Chicago, IL (Abbey Pub)
2. Sonic Youth, Cincinnati, OH (Bogart’s)
1. Arthur Lee/Love, Chicago, IL (Park West)

Tuesday Morning Top Ten (after Todd Colby)

10. Bill Clinton is "lost in a political funhouse"?
9. tapas
8. warm Chicago weather
7. more coffee
6. getting lost in Jewel
5. the Final Four
4. f#*%@cking gas prices
3. rereading David Meltzer
2. Facebook
1. birds

Daniel Borzutzky, Patrick Durgin, Tim Yu, and Simon DeDeo after Patrick and Tim's reading last night at Myopic. It was a huge weekend of readings. Kristy Odelius read collaborative poems with Tim, too. Chicago = ground zero for much exciting writing recently.

I'll be reading some of my poetry this Friday for Cracked Slab Books as part of Small Press Poetry Month at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago Ballroom at 6:30.






Small Press Showcase
[sponsored by the Poetry Center of Chicago]
Friday, March 28, 6:30
SAIC Ballroom
112 S. Michigan Ave.
Chicago

L’Albatross

Here is my homophonic or blind translation of Baudelaire's poem L'Albatross followed by the original.

*

Souvenir for the amused, home for equipment,
pennant deaf, I’ll bat Os, vast as axes, these marred
solvents, indolent companions, the voyage
navigable and glistening. Surface of gilded Americans

a penny haunts the dispossessed, plantains
aren’t ok, big and blue, there are malleable honchos
lazy pity parties, grand and blanching. My
communiqué trains aviators, coats and ducks.

Ill voyager, commune with gauchos playing violas.
Naugahyde bro, quit Comcasting and lay.
Lunar grape minus vex, a billiard ghoul
auctions mimes, and buoyant we confirm violets!

Poet, you resemble a prince at a new desk,
but quit haunting tapas and write about archers.
Your exile is a solitary and million wheeze.
What ailment gallops ‘cross the peach of March?

*

Souvent, pour s'amuser, les hommes d'équipage
Prennent des albatros, vastes oiseaux des mers,
Qui suivent, indolents compagnons de voyage,
Le navire glissant sur les gouffres amers.

À peine les ont-ils déposés sur les planches,
Que ces rois de l'azur, maladroits et honteux,
Laissent piteusement leurs grandes ailes blanches
Comme des avirons traîner à côté d'eux.

Ce voyageur ailé, comme il est gauche et veule!
Lui, naguère si beau, qu'il est comique et laid!
L'un agace son bec avec un brûle-gueule,
L'autre mime, en boitant, l'infirme qui volait!

Le Poète est semblable au prince des nuées
Qui hante la tempête et se rit de l'archer;
Exilé sur le sol au milieu des huées,
Ses ailes de géant l'empêchent de marcher.

______________________________

Homophonic translation: Take a poem in a foreign language that you can pronounce but not necessarily understand and translate the sound of the poem into English (e.g., French "blanc" to blank or "toute" to toot). Some examples: Louis and Celia Zukofsky's Catullus., David Melnick's Homer, now available via Eclipse: Men in Aida -- part one and part two. The preceding is a description of homophonic translation from Charles Bernstein's Web page, but this "form" has had many various practitioners since Bernadette Mayer created her famous list of writing experiments. It's a great way to break out and create some fresh word associations from old poems.

Signing up for Google Analytics allows me to check in occasionally to see who’s reading milkmag.org. Visitors to the site come mainly from these ten countries: United States, Hong Kong, United Kingdom, Canada, France, Malaysia, South Africa, China, Brazil, and Japan.

I have a specific memory of seeing “2001: A Space Odyssey” with my parents at the movie theater. I had fallen asleep about midway through the film and woke up during the time-travel sequence. From watching “Electric Company” and “The Flintstones” to that was quite a huge leap—I’d never seen anything like that in a movie. Arthur C. Clarke, a man who envisioned the idea of telecommunications satellites in the 1940s, has died. It goes without saying that minus the satellites circling earth, our world would be a much different place.

Stanley Kubrick turned “2001” into a huge visual metaphor that still has the power to amaze. Let’s hope Hal never comes true. On an semi-unrelated note, if you haven’t seen “Colour Me Kubrick” with John Malkovich, it’s worth a look.

Vanishing Point

The particular yous
that witness some conscience
remember the light.
In the pool of metaphor
there floats drifting and blowing
the shape of a skyline.

These details that bark
attest to the discovery of thought,
and the snow remembers
your eyes’ invitations.

I've uploaded an e-chapbook to milkmag.org. It's Unusual Woods by Gene Tanta. And here's the cover of the editor's favorite Beefheart album. But Doc at the Radar Station is pretty cool, too.

Witness the spectacle of the resurrection of the Exquisite Corpse. Codrescu and Co. live to edit another day. In other news, I'm going to hit the west coast for a week of much-needed sun in LA.

Upcoming Poetry @ Myopic Books, 7pm

Sunday, March 23 - Andrew Lundwall & Daniela Olszewska

Sunday, March 30 -Tim Yu & Patrick Durgin

Sunday, April 20 - Kathleen Rooney, Elisa Gabbert, & Simone Muench

Sunday, April 27 - Nikki Wallschlaeger & Kelly Lydick

Sunday, May 18 - Bill Berkson

Sunday, October 19 - Brenda Iijima

______________________________________________

Location:
1564 N. Milwaukee Ave
Chicago, IL 60622

Contact:
773.862.4882

The Five Obstructions

Jørgen Leth assumes a Sisyphean task, as assigned by Lars Von Trier, and descends into a creative hell of his own choosing. Leth’s assignment: Remake his own short film “The Perfect Human” numerous times using various constraints dictated by filmmaker Lars Von Trier. Leth accepts the challenge and I had to wonder how two American filmmakers would handle a similar duel. It would be interesting to see Christopher Nolan go up against Tim Burton, for example. The sparring could most easily be compared to a game of chess, were it not that Leth seems nearly gleeful in some existential way in his knowledge that accepting the challenge means he is already the loser. Or do I mean winner? Somehow this acceptance riles Von Trier all the more as he realizes that Leth’s centeredness makes him nearly impenetrable and not the target that Von Trier hoped he would be. The final obstruction finds Von Trier in an attempt to “become” Leth, as he commands that the latter pronounce dialogue written for the “perfect human,” which we now realize is Leth (according to Von Trier, anyway.) If any, or all that, is confusing it won’t be after you watch the film. Interspersed throughout, Leth’s original 1967 short film, “The Perfect Human” perfectly underscores “The Five Obstructions,” which is the best documentary I’ve seen recently.

Direct any calls to Waveland Bowl this weekend. I'll be hitting the '08 Lebowski Fest and rolling a few games. We'll be working in shifts.

{from} Life Cannons

We thaw to change and break the anger of its days,
when beaches stretch to the vision of some Goofy, who

plates a table for a last supper had by cartoon seagulls.

As when Buster Keaton stands and the framehouse falls around him,
or the singing of "La Marseillaise" in "Casablanca."

Else Snow White kissing Bashful and Dopey on the head in "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs."

Like Jimmy Stewart in "Vertigo," approaching Kim Novak across the room, realizing she embodies all of his obsessions—better than he knows.

And John Wayne putting the reins in his mouth in "True Grit" and galloping across the mountain meadow, six-shooters in both hands.

Remember Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta discussing what they call Quarter Pounders in France, in "Pulp Fiction"?

The Man in the Moon getting a cannon shell in his eye, in the Georges Melies film "A Voyage to the Moon"?

(Urgent, ringing telephone.)

Nearly identical to the way Zero Mostel throws a cup of cold coffee at the hysterical Gene Wilder in Mel Brooks' "The Producers," and Wilder screaming: "I'm still hysterical! Plus, now I'm wet!"

Marlon Brando is still screaming "Stella!" in "A Streetcar Named Desire."

Jack Nicholson is still trying to order a chicken salad sandwich in "Five Easy Pieces."

However, the ambiguous pair of lips in "Citizen Kane" no longer pronounces "Rosebud."

How about the haunted eyes of Antoine Doinel, Truffaut's autobiographical hero, in the freeze frame that ends "The 400 Blows"?

What we’ve got here is a failure to communicate, Cool Hand Luke.

Anne Frank said "In spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart."

We need Jean-Paul Belmondo to flip a cigarette into his mouth in Godard's "Breathless" and Moses to part the Red Sea in "The Ten Commandments."

We need to find an old dead man in a child's swing, his mission completed, at the end of Kurosawa's "Ikiru."

We need to hear the word “plastics” in the “The Graduate.”

We need "There's a spider in your bathroom the size of a Buick!" from Woody Allen in "Annie Hall."

We’re running down that hill with Indiana Jones being chased by 100 Pacific islanders with bows and arrows as he leaps into a plane with “Snakes!”

You are the knight who plays chess with Death, in Bergman's "The Seventh Seal."

And “We ain't got no badges. We don't need no badges. I don't have to show you any stinkin' badges!" according to Alfonso Bedoya in "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre."

We need "I want to live again. I want to live again. Please God, let me live again."

We need "Forget about it, Jake. It’s Chinatown."

Literago

Las Vegans at the edge of sleep
desire and satiate that desire by
accessorizing to where
she bites off a piece of wind
and blows it upward into birds.

The loaded hell of your mouth
yawns big as Wednesday
cusps each evening with a stiletto that
sidewalks as earth’s icing at the
ledge of oligarchy.

Mystique, in league with
captives of perspective,
like a swarm of advertisements
perambulates along the avenues.

According to Robert Samuelson at Newsweek, Barack Obama has already failed.

Florida schools are now permitted to use the term "evolution" in their curricula. Just as soon as they familiarize themselves with other recent events, they'll be ready to join us in the 20th, I mean 21st, Century.

Bush's approval rating is the lowest in the history of surveys.

China has banned foreign cartoons. Spongebob and Patrick, those weisenheimers, will have to take their subversive underwater shtick elsewhere.

Danny Ocean is the UN's messenger of peace? I voted for Elliot Gould. C'mon. Don't you remember "Capt. John Francis Xavier 'Trapper John' McIntyre"?

Night by the Encyclopedia

I loved you then, mostly for your tacos. They were like
small victories in the second Boer War (or Tweede Vryheidsoorlog).
I read The New York Times for the typos and
occasionally would run,
like a fool I know,
to the feed store to get more tangerines. And nothing could
quench our thirst for history

as explanations drifted through the streets like two discarded newspapers.

My path of snow that runs through night
could it be said that we were in love
she announced to the room as if asking for more salsa

as the television removed its clothes.

And what voices were so busy polishing our eyes
for another day of symmetry where the mountain sleeps?

Canadian poet Rob Mclennan is relentless...his online posts are voluminous and he’s a publishing monster. Swimming around in the world of Ottawa poetry is nearly making me forget this marathon Chicago winter. If it’s this cold here, the folks even farther north must be solid.

My collaboration with Joe Kimball has finally been published in the new issue of Mome. Here's one of my shlocky storyboards alongside a panel from the finished piece.

Ticket to What

This isn’t nature’s duel weakness,
truth comes early in the throat
a blanched monkey, stout as birth.
Hellborn and helpless these months
ache like inconspicuous stems.
Criminal grapes fill with echoes.
My pleated lives really feel,
cycloptic beasts who, greenish, need
and we’re brained and dying among false
trembling flowers. Early or die
just for the taking. What they do to you
come a month. We’re empty,
good. Might live, expect something more
than dimes for food.

The happy confusion of Amy King-- one of my favorite poets.

Orbiting Planet You

Tell the forest leaves to quit their labor
my heart is a candelabra of dice.
Here in your studio of dreams
among autumn clocks I quince.
If I could ice your anesthetic,
echo an ocean twelve years.
But your shimmering voices
the quality of your amber.

The General panics
earlier brandishing gentians.



Itself cognition,
rhetoric reveals its sores.


What jazzing hands
Take your grievances to the particulars?


Life pancakes as
The faraway uncertainties.



You are coconuts -
Mount Fuji in drag.




What shrine to realism
burns in moonlight.

Because I write poetry, I often get into conversations with nonpoets about writing and writing poetry in particular. When recently asked about poetry by a person whom I know who holds many advanced degrees but doesn’t often read poetry except as a mental exercise or dessert to his main dish of academic or sociological regular reading, I found myself recommending poets whose work I don’t even read. It crossed my mind that living in this country and continuously consuming the goods and services offered here in the U.S. often leads to a practical view of art (for the nonspecialist). Time won’t be invested (even fifteen minutes) if there won’t be some kind of return on that investment, i.e., what’s in it for me? Art is intrinsically not a practical endeavor but leads the viewer or creator toward an aesthetic experience, i.e., art isn’t typically utilitarian, architecture notwithstanding. So, I ended up finding myself talking about Gary Snyder’s poetry because of its relative accessibility. Snyder used plain language to explore concepts and philosophical questions related to his own quest for understanding and he has lived his life on many continents as a proponent of eco-awareness and green-consciousness before those terms had really even entered the popular vernacular. So, why wouldn’t I recommend to a non-writer of poetry the poetry that I admire and read? I guess the self-editing involved as I size-up the asker of such a question leads me to make certain assumptions based on the asker’s appearance and the context of the question as related to the tone of the conversation that preceded it has a lot to do with my response, too. I’m going to make a conscious effort to not self-edit in the future though when asked this kind of question, because it would be better for anyone interested in reading poetry to dive right in to the best poetry written versus to read selections that are *accessible.*

The more genuine answer would be to say that it would be a good idea to dig up a copy of The Desert Music by William Carlos Williams, Harmonium by Wallace Stevens, The Tennis Court Oath, by John Ashbery, Lunch Poems by Frank O’Hara, or even more recent titles like A Fiddle Pulled from the Throat of a Sparrow, by Noah Eli Gordon, or Do Not Awaken Them With Hammers by Lidija Dimkovska. Picking up great anthologies like Bay Poetics or The City Visible is a good way to gauge what’s going on in poetry right now, too. No more will I recommend poets I don’t even read, although the writing itself may be worthwhile. I shouldn’t do any more corrective steering. I’m not even driving the car.

Another City Visible review... This one by Tom Hibbard.

I'm going to finally make it over to
Intuit Gallery today to see the Henry Darger exhibit. Darger lived out his reclusive life in his one-room Lincoln Park, Chicago apartment working as a janitor by day, but at night working on his 15,000 page novel, complete with illustrations about the angelic Vivian Girls, who lead a rebellion against godless, child-enslaving men. Darger attended church daily and rarely spoke, so when his work was discovered by his landlady months before his death it started a landslide of interest in the man who some consider the most amazing of the "outsider" artists. The documentary In the Realms of the Unreal by Jessica Yu that PBS ran a few years ago is interesting to say the least. Darger was certainly the most prolific of all outsider artists. At the time of his death in 1973 he was working on the 3,000 page sequel to his voluminous first novel. His landlady eventually became executor of his estate, which comprises thousands of original illustrations meticulously drawn by Darger himself, in addition to the handwritten pages to what may be the longest and most bizarre novel ever written.

Bill Berkson gave me advance warning that the MoMA edition of In Memory of My Feelings that he edited has been remaindered, so I picked up a copy on Amazon for twenty bucks. It's an incredible bargain and wonderful book. I'd scramble over to Amazon.com and see if there are any still available. And here's a photo of Lana Turner (nearly) collapsing.

You've Put Off Writing Long Enough

He was continually greedy for the stars
and chunked belief with an ax called god
night’s beautiful throat
more thorn than shadow
entered the sepulcher of all he shot
and grey were the ochre crosses of his days.
He slept at night a tender sleep
warmed his spirit in a needle’s womb
boiled a compass to make a tear
wandered the calendar of a yellowed year
and fought in horror the waiting deep
lining moonlight with his fence of sighs.

Miracle of Apples

Someday the apples will be liberated, the pear
will start a revolution and the banana will
commit suicide, rather than be executed. In tense meetings,
the cantaloupe has come up with a new political system.
It exists at the center of an ovoid universe, on a long summer afternoon.

You dream of secret conversations that drip with sticky, pink juice.

Yesterday, the pomegranate gave a speech and received a rousing ovation.
But at midnight, patrols of vegetables rode through town,
plastering posters of the banana on every available wall.
Grapes everywhere were deceived into joining the
knives, forks, dishes, mugs, and even a glass of wine.

Now dinner has descended upon me.
They will lead me to my ordinary death,
as real as the breath of a cannibal.

The snooze award goes to the poet Louise Glück. How this Pulitzer prize-winner reached the heights she has is a mystery on par with missing planes in a certain northeastern region of the Caribbean or how the ancient Egyptians managed to lift tons of stone in desert heat to construct, without mortar, structures that have lasted centuries. Glück also won the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Academy of American Poets Prize, numerous Guggenheim fellowships, and was appointed Poet Laureate of the United States (2003-2004). It may be that she is an award-winner because her poetry is such a non-issue. It offends no one, possesses no memorable lines, does nothing to re-invent the language, and uses the most prosaic, flat language imaginable. It lumbers in a boring fog. I stumbled across this excerpt from one of her poems at the Poetry Foundation Web site.

Midsummer

On nights like this we used to swim in the quarry,
the boys making up games requiring them to tear off  the girls’ clothes
and the girls cooperating, because they had new bodies since last summer
and they wanted to exhibit them, the brave ones
leaping off  the high rocks ,  bodies crowding the water.

The nights were humid, still. The stone was cool and wet,
marble for  graveyards, for buildings that we never saw,
buildings in cities far away.

On cloudy nights, you were blind. Those nights the rocks were dangerous,
but in another way it was all dangerous, that was what we were after.
The summer started. Then the boys and girls began to pair off
but always there were a few left at the end , sometimes they’d keep watch,
sometimes they’d pretend to go off  with each other like the rest,
but what could they do there, in the woods? No one wanted to be them.
But they’d show up anyway, as though some night their luck would change,
fate would be a different fate. . .

Emotion recollected in tranquility? Wordsworth must not have meant for his prescription to result in a state of catatonia. When compared with the poetry of someone writing at the level of Anne Sexton it becomes clearer how Glück is just riffing. Sexton used enjambment to create momentum or stop it, interesting or shocking imagery, abrupt shifts in tense and perspective, and touched upon universal themes that resonate in the imagination. Writers like John Ashbery also churn out consistently surprising lines that take the reader someplace unexpected. His diction is like watching fireworks in a barely remembered dream. The laxness of Glück’s lines don’t give the reader the impression that the poem necessarily even requires any line breaks. It could exist just as easily as a block of prose. The experience she points to isn’t overly sentimental, which is the main fault of most bad writing, but she provides annoying over-direction. Poets like Pierre Reverdy knew that the human mind is able to make many unseen connections when presented with an outline with lines missing. Poets like Glück provide too much information. Poems are objects that shouldn’t explain themselves. The narrative aspect of poems like this override what poetry is. Poetry is figurative language that uses techniques like parataxis, metaphor, rhythm, enjambment, alliteration, imagery, apostrophe, personification, allusion, and other elements to give language a spatial quality. Poetry isn’t the medium used to convey information. That’s why we have newspapers.

A masque/ Beyond the planets.

The Poetry Foundation Web site is a tad bit wheezy, but I get a kick out of the idea of "celebrity poets." Call me the romantic capital "r," but I do believe that to a certain extent poets are born and not made. What I would term "Lizard King" syndrome drives fans of celebrities to pick up their books of poetry to get a taste of the inner-most thoughts of those said celebrities. I'm being sincere when I say that whomsoever felt any comfort in books like Touch Me by Suzanne Somers is welcome to it. I'm somewhat of a populist in that I hope those who come to poetry do so for many varied reasons and it's been a blessing and somewhat of a curse for me, so I do hope that poetry provides something more than an intellectual game for those who read it. As a 14-year-old I remember very clearly buying No One Here Gets Out Alive and reading for the first time about Jim Morrison's infatuation with the writing of Arthur Rimbaud. I don't criticize those who would scramble to buy a book of poetry by Alicia Keys. The best thing that can happen to someone reading poetry of any kind for the first time would be that it spurs something to happen. If the reader of Ally Sheedy's or Billy Corgans' poetry goes on to become whatever it is they feel they need to be then all the better. Poetry isn't about an experience it is an experience. At the very least it's been proven that reading poetry increases ones ability to think abstractly. Wallace Stevens would be the prescription if that's the goal. Just don't ask me to ever give up my treasured copy of Listen to the Warm by Rod McKuen. It's the Plan 9 From Outer Space of poetry.

My upcoming readings ...

Feb 1 - DVA Gallery, 2568 N. Lincoln, Chicago, 8pm

May 1 - Observable Books Reading Series, with Ken Rumble and Matt Freeman, 7260 Southwest Ave. (at Manchester) Maplewood, MO, 8pm

June 8 - Chicago Poetry Showcase, Printers Row Book Fair, 3-5pm

www.milkmag.org is included in the 2009 Colophon, Luxembourg journals exhibition.

I love rediscovering poems after I’ve forgotten that I wrote them. Here’s one from years ago on The East Village.

On the horizon: My interview with Malcolm McNeill on www.bigbridge.org. The topic: His collaboration with William S. Burroughs on the elusive book Ah Puch Is Here, life in seventies London, and the alchemy of high-stakes illustration.

DVA Gallery

Thanks, Charlie Newman, for scheduling my February 1 reading at DVA Gallery. Come on down. While you're there, buy a Shag lunchbox.

This blog is now 1 year old. Cake is forthcoming.

Thanks, Simone Muench, for the mention.

Whalen

The Poetry Foundation list of 2007 poetry best sellers is no shocker. It doesn’t logically follow that the best poetry ever written is necessarily being written right now simply because it seems that more poetry is being written now than ever before, but what explains the myopia of this list? My answer would be that the poetry of Billy Collins simply reinforces the expectations and prejudices of the reader and the public at large is not interested in reading poetry that requires anything more than minimal effort. Collins’ poetry never fails to lead the reader to an "aw-shucks" moment. Banalities should be used, if ever, as a starting point only. Poems should introduce the reader to something not seen before, not reinforce the commonplace and provide cornball reassurance. Charles Bukowski didn’t find his massive audience by dealing in banalities, but his uber-macho persona has succeeded in selling books where his poetry falls short of taking the art any farther than the hundreds of lesser well-known poets who are living right now and writing poems that are far more successful on many levels, technical and otherwise.

William Carlos Williams excelled at extracting valuable ore from everyday moments and distilling the quintessence of these thoughts and feelings into poetry. Every syllable in a poem by William Carlos Williams, or Emily Dickinson, is a counterpoint to the cacophony of everyday noise in life that seeks to deaden the senses. Collins would sooner cover the world in Formica rather than with what’s needed right now...granite.

According to Collins: ...I have one reader in mind, someone who is in the room with me, and who I'm talking to, and I want to make sure I don't talk too fast, or too glibly. Usually I try to create a hospitable tone at the beginning of a poem. Stepping from the title to the first lines is like stepping into a canoe. A lot of things can go wrong.


* * *

It is difficult/to get the news from poems/yet men die miserably every day/for lack/of what is found there.

Asphodel, That Greeny Flower still serves as a prime example of how Williams could illuminate without leaving the reader behind. The universal aspect of what he wrote could be carried through in any language, because real insights are offered. The most effective humor in poetry always falls on the side of satire. A comedic element often exposes hypocrisy more memorably than anything. There’s nothing wrong with occasional poetry or appreciating humor or lightness of touch when that’s what works, but it appears that Collins’ efforts to spread an appreciation of poetry only served to spread an appreciation for himself.

Readers would be better off investing in the big new Collected Poems of Philip Whalen, or Frank O’Hara: Poems from the Tibor de Nagy Editions than picking up yet another book by an author such as Collins or Bukowski. In readers’ defense, there’s no resource out there to unmask charlatans and poets end up being the only audience for poets’ poets such as Whalen who of anyone writing in the last century was most deserving of a far wider audience.

Who Wants to Smell

We rub the suffering earth make it real
who wants to sexy the host ebulliently asks.
I like a rock music I like a heavy metal the contestant shouts.
We are just becoming visible
our surfaces are sure
and that we wait for answers
is fundamentally daring.

Get your New Year's resolution printed on Time's Square Confetti.

Here Comes My Meteor

Chucking the future
for a bygone shadow
leaving the antlers of
history on the table
as the only evidence
that nothing resembles
these particular shadows
as much as Happy Days
what will you
say to the man mirror
who grins like a
tortoise in a desert
can you Black & Decker
this economy
smiley face IM
Apollinaire knew in
Zone, life no longer
new car smelly
something so
perfect about a
block of ice in which
the zeitgeist
dances, suspended
like a Rx

Thanks for mentioning me on the Ploughshares blog, Kristy.

Silver Wonder Press

Silver Wonder Press here in Chicago has just released Lee Ranaldo's "Hello From the American Desert" with an introduction by New York poet Todd Colby. The Silver Wonder Web site is looking really good. My chapbook "Disharmonium" will be the next book published in Silver Wonder's chapbook series. Many thanks to Chris Gibson for the exceptional job he's doing with Silver Wonder -- it's definitely worth it to buy some of what's offered on the site. Silver Wonder rocks (literally). Have a look.

Beneath the Eyelids—Storm

—after Robert Kelly

Meloncholia mise-en-scène,
aloof, these branches
droop
pushed upward no-
thing hums, these
Maskenstilleben
à la carte?

Look, to be
seen as if then to raze
from memory some
loam belonging
to speech starting
carousel of womb,
making sense
of time, sotto voce.

New chapbook on the way.

More info. on the Observable Books Reading Series.

Here's my holiday greeting to the city of Chicago in the Trib.

And an audio file of one of my poems read on Bob Marcacci's MiPo Radio. Happy holidays to readers of this blog. Thanks for checking in.