The Poetry Project Newsletter, issue #195, for June-September 2003, edited by Nada Gordon and Gary Sullivan is hot of the press! The issue is mostly devoted to blogging and bloggers with pieces, for the most part drawn from the blogs of Drew Gardner, Stephanie Young, Patrick Durgin, David Hess, Jack Kimball, Jordan Davis, Tim Yu, Heriberto Yepez, Eileen Tabios, Brandon Barr, Marianne Shaneen, Mairead Byrne, Camille Roy; a poem by Marianne Moore adapted to the topic of blogging by Brian Kim Stefans, a conversation drawn from the blogs of Josh Corey and K. Silem Mohammed; and Jack Kimball on new work by Bruce Andrews, Joe Elliot, David Larsen, Carol Mirakove, Rene Ricard and Lytle Shaw. This gala, but final issue to be edited by Gary and Nada includes an in-depth review of George Stanley's *A Tall Serious Girl* by Lewis Warsh and a terrific comic strip by Sharon Mesmer and David Bourchart *Rebuilding the City of The Future*and a piece by me titled "Confessions of a Blog Artist." Free to members, the issue costs $5. The Poetry Project is located at 131 East 10th Street, NY , NY 10003, (212) 674-0910. Email poproj@thorn.net
web site: www.poetryproject.com

Nick's Bloglink Crush List- (most recent links)

prrrowess...Nada Gordon's Poem Blog

abolone..Li Bloom

Tympan...Tim Yu

Porthole Redux ....Catherine Meng
Mr.Tong Bliss' Journal...Joe Massey

Human Verb...Noah Eli Gordon

tex files...Chris Murray

Parking Lot...Chris Corrigan

Black Spring...Meno ter Braak

Chimera Song Mosaic...Deborah D

The Jetty...Cassie Lewis

No Starting Point...Emma Barnes

double visions of Johanna

Technorati Cosmos

Mike Snider's Formal Blog

Ernesto Priego...Never Neutral


(apologies to Jimmy Behrle for lifting some of his links and his "crush list" idea, but, as we all know, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and it's easy)

"K. Silem Mohammad will never reveal his mysterious bloglink categorization system."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Oh, Kasey, please, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out this "mystery."

HInt: Check out Category E. 16 men, two women. This must be Kasey's "kickass" maximum security prison category.

Cassie Lewis...The Jetty is the author of several "Postcard Poems" books, including one with Stephanie Young. Two of her postcard poems are just out in Shampoo 17. If you're living- or going- to San Francisco, she has a reading with K. Silem Mohammed in the famous at home reading series in David Hadbawnik's apartment. Cassie Lewis is interested in collage! Here's one from her postcard collab with Stephanie:

Found Objects

I got to thinking about collage and whether
or not to practice it. Remembered how
when I made an Expresso book
called "Experiments" all I used
for the cover was a faded shirt
of this most gorgeous fabric, shimmery
on one side matte on the other. I stuck a
ripped square on the cover of each book.
Felt good to recycle this thing of beauty,
my old best shirt.

*

Friday, June 13, 7.30pm – K. Silem Mohammad and Cassie Lewis
Willl be reading at David Hadbawnik's reading series
at his apartment in San Francisco.
Directions:

Public trans: From downtown San Francisco, take the 38 Geary
or the 31 Balboa, and get off at 35th Ave.
Driving: drive to 35th and Balboa, park. David's building is the big one
on the northwest corner of the street. Ring the buzzer for apartment
204.
NOTE: the phone will be turned off after 8pm, so don’t be late!!!

7/1/89

Reading Pavese's diaries. The illusion the book offers is that it can represent time moving faster than it does, that we could skip over events and get an overview. What this neglects, and the diary form restores, is that the insight is the event, par excellence, in the best literary sense. The book ignores the philosophical basic tenet that knowledge of the truth, and the gaining of that knowledge, constitutes a valuable kind of condensing that the "sequence of events" leading up to it obviates in their importance. This event marks a beginning of a new *order* of events on a certain plane.

Perhaps Pavese was akind of "backwards" person in that he ended his biological life at precisely the time that a certain mythical (fictional or poeticas) figure dissolved of itself.

7/4/89
Small occurances which are trifling in the large (macro) world, but momentous in the microworld.

Satie: the "child's" march. Self-importance of these little men.

7/9/89

That some writers (Pavese is one) cannot sustain very much joy in life- a factor which makes their words appear more ironic than they are. (Karl Kraus: the closer you look at a word, the more distantly it looks back).

We venerate the sustained effort it takes to write a book- and are blind to the sustained effort it takes to live a life. Or should I say- go blind in the sustained effort it takes to live a life. But intellectuals romanticize their losses- try to build something out of them. Other people feel an absence and try to find a way to shrug it off. The annoying tendency that intllectuals have of celebrating *all* perceptions- including odious ones. I mean , I can admire the way you cannibalize your own experiences without really enjoying it.

But this is all a vicious cycle, in a sense.

Do I burst your bubble in order to make to make you look at mine?

later:

The coffee grinder and her lover

7/12 Wednesday

Eventful vs. non-eventful
Chipping, scratching
Coalesce- conversely
Dividing
Soaked, absorbed
Drained
Stained
Remains
'Markers
Records
Could touch- feel the difference
Together whisper forth
Early remembrance
Tap-tap
Can place it

(An unsent letter, around 10/77)

My whole body is trembling. It isn't only happy, it's sad. Everything that verges on being more than being draws up with it a longing for freedom of feeling and action greater than one could have even imagined just before. And every floating color that vanishes into memory records delicate reflections, representations of actual experience which is the greatest healer and guide. Moments we shared, even re-inventing the pronoun incites a mysterious venturesomeness, a daring that hides in its face the doubts that turn one's head away from the next turn. Only this one may be straight or was straight until we turned back before the trees, before night, into the red tailights and green signs and the door with its quietness behind it. I feel, as I kiss you, I can hold your breathing, I want to laugh till we shake some yellow leaves down, taken down, done down to the deepest kisses imaginable. Saturday did give me a reminder, many reminders of that scent. But I'm back there again. Only I hold your image before my mind, a metaphor of a pronoun, the memory, like the way to open the camera or to load it, the thing in my hands like a wounded animal to be taken to the front of the car. I guess there aren't any photographs that could conjure up the thought teased away by your voice- I must have- you did too- there's we, and a sentence unfolds to depict the whole blue sky and the raining trees. The deepest memories are being remembered and forgotten into the deepest
chambers of memory. Can we find our way back? Can we rewind the tape, wind the film, always with the wind of tomorrow blowing into our faces? Lead us back, find our way to the path through the low bushes across from the off-center main spot of the field on which so softly we spoke- we do it to make them listen as we do- only *once*- and now I'll leave us there, in our jackets, in the October clear sun, high, immersed in each other's thousands of faces.

Love,
Nick

Don't miss an exceptionally thought provoking piece today by Caterina on the photographer Andreas Gursky and poet Walt Whitman.
*
I regret only finding out about the most amazing Kurt Schwitters show I've ever seen just a few days before it ended, which was today. It was at the Ubu Gallery. Fortunately there is a catalogue available with color prints of every one of the 60 pieces in show. Comfortably priced at $20! Ubu is at 416 East 59th Street, New York,NY 10022 info@ubugallery.com www.ubugallery.com

*

DOOR WIDE OPEN
At the Bowery Poetry Club
308 Bowery, NYC
this Saturday, May 17th at 7:30pm

With performances every Saturday & Sunday
At 7:30pm, through June.

For reservations and information, call 212-614-0505,
Or book tickets on-line at www.bowerypoetry.com
Tickets $15. An Actors Equity Showcase.

SPECIAL DEAL FOR POETS!!!! Use the code word MIRANDA
for $10 tickets at any performance!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Click on the following link to zzoz.com
For a feature on the play, with a beautiful color photo
of John Ventimiglia & Adira Amram as Jack Kerouac & Joyce Johnson
/www.zzoz.com/theater.html

3/2/76

Am I making the same mistake? Tonight I see a similar selfishness. The stuff about babies- not asking about myself- nothing about F's feelings- Whimsy- the withdrawal-quick to anger- flirtatious with S- sutff about money- *watch this*- I feel afraid tonight that she's a lot like W- I thought this with the acting and t.v stuff- if she is, she won't understand- I must protect myself- got scared tonight when she suddenly got cold- also "announcing" "no abortion"- Special kind of object choice?

1) Don't accuse
2) decide if my needs are being considered
3) remember my own boundaries (money and things)
4) watch anger
5) don't be afraid to ask if she will do something
6) stop, look and listen- does she listen?
7) take your time
8) you can always make it alone
9) don't sentimentalize
10) look at positives too
11)don't overdramatize
12)be realistic
13) don't get down on yourself or J

(Between 6/75 and 3/76)

Objects- Self- Others

I know which piles to lift. I leave the objects in disorder and later try to translate why they were left in that specific order. This arrangement is not necessarily parallel to any series of actions performed at predictable intervals. If value is used as a gauge, the self is also evaluated because the relationship between the self and the object and the self and others must also be evaluated. Also the objects are viewed abstracted- as messages. My imagination chooses to dwell on the associations. The singular object separated from its relationship with the others becomes a totem to disorder. I freeze the possible action before its realization into reaction. The reaction becomes abstracted from the utililty of the object. The visualization of the object's image thus becomes primary to locating it. I don't reach for it visually or physically first, but mentally.

1/30/98

While I'm reading silently, a tape is playing which represents my thoughts "about" the poem. Then I read the poem aloud. While I'm reading aloud, I'm recording the poem. Then I play the recorded poem while I write something about that. Then I read what I've written while I've listened to the poem.

2/6/98

To take a note is to think about it. To publish it is to speak it out loud.

Also: "Out loud" is said louder than "aloud."

*

There are people who think that to "work with" is to subordinate. But most people sense, even if they don't know, that this is true.

2/8/98

What's The Matter (Daria Fain)

Get material from consultants

Brainstorm w/ peformers as Tuesday rehearsals

Using "art of memory"
Frances Yates
(use of "locii")

Camillo- theater of Camillo

7 different planets
7 rows- each row has a myth
store all knowledge in different place

Gorgon myth, narcissus
Persephone, etc

(ink sketch of a radiating sun)

Kathleen's article
Is there a place of origin that we can relate-

4/3/98

"God" would be an infinitely slower process than anything ordinarily imaginable, if it did exist. Perhaps the earliest monuments- Easter Island, Stonehenge, the Pyramids of Egypt and of Mexico. The same with "locale." This is a permanent "locale"- only a relationship of forces, where this locale, under those rarest of circumstances... The patient waiting attiutude of the mystics, the wild-eyed supplicants, the loneliest of ecstacies. Perhaps the body is the true unconscious of the mind. We try to separate mind from the body in the same way the child separates mother and father. To divide is to conquer. The body and the mind are not like negative and postive, but an endless dualism like male and female. Even in ths case, we too easily fall into thinking of the "war between the sexes," akin to "war." But "war" at the very least, is a sign of anxiety. It is evidenced by an unwillingness to wait. Ideals pit us against each other as they pull us towards each other. We set ideals before ourselves, hoping for an ultimate surmounting of the dialectic. But, like infinity set against limit, there can only be an oscillation, not a victory or resolution . One "spurs" the other, acts as a spur of the other, even in their occasional opposition. But this requires as much the ability to tolerate dissatisfaction as it does to combat what it perceives as the obstacles.

We always come back, that is the body. It is continually our spur, as much as it is a receiving and transformative mechanism. Our minds "ride" our bodies, much as the horse-tamer rides the bucking bronco. It is a powerhouse which will throw us around if our minds cannot comprehend it and have the ability to loosen the reins as much as tightening them. And still, as we ocassionally loosen the reins and let it go as passionately devouring it can be one of life's pleasures, and we know then to ask it to go into the background again as our mind takes over.

Sleep is like this. We have to let ourselves fall into it and this is partly why the dream is the model for an ongoing daily mechanism which graphically displays the mind and body relationship.

The patient had observed a woman give birth to a baby in a situation reminiscent of an earlier time in her life when she was still living with her son. She had to help the mother give birth but there was nothing to cut the umbilical cord with . But the baby was born with teeth and then she and the baby and the mother sit down and eat dessert at a restaurant. The all sit down to eat Creme Brulet. Then she is going up some shaky stairs.

Although this dream can be analyzed on many levels, the part I am interested in right now is how the mother can make peace with the parting of the body (to me, notably the issue of separating from the mother and still find ecstatic pleasure in life for herself.) In fact, she has never really left her child (her baby) and despite all the pain and crisis, life can be still enjoyed.

But this requires negotiations. The table is the symbolic site of negotiations, as the meal symbolically represents the totemic rite of of incorporation through oral ritual. In fact, the dream, the Creme Brulet of all pleasure sustains a special place in our feelings- child and mother are both still entitled to it, in spite of separation and loss.

Wash those blues away!

Shampoo Issue #17 just out.

Nada Gordon is definitely in a kick the podium mood, and when Stephanie Young starts numbering her blog, she's tapping that red shoe, better listen up:

Well Nourished Moon recently had this to say:


"2. Tim posts a call for papers from the "University of Minnesota Blog Collective" for a conference! Into the blogosphere. When is the Jism blogcon? & will there be a call for papers, or just nudie pics? But I'm serious. I want a summertime blog con."



"The Blog Stripped Bare By Her Bachelors, Even?"

Second the motion for the summertime blog symposium!

9:15 AM ) Nada  
Thinking about how everyone's blog (like, I suppose, everyone's personality) is too something. Surely you've thought this too. #
      ( 9:14 AM ) Nada  
Five more days of rain slated. Mercury still retrograde through June 5. #

True, Nada, every voice in the ensemble will reach beyond, but remain, itself; every instrument in the orchestra, except for the occasional solo, or monologue, or recitatif, will ultimately grate, would be incomplete, without that intriguing "overlap" or curious or challenging dissonance with the others; wandering from one blog to another, especially now, in the relentless minor key of mercury retrograde, is more than a pleasure: it is a refuge.

What about what's left of Europe
For the rest of us? In Nurnberg
I learned German, though I can't speak it.
It speaks through me. Mere lies...
What a lesson to untangle.
Spirited outside, the master temporizes.

Language temporizes, still it's enough
To dampen enthusiasms before they arise.
Playing the accordian, I mumble,
What's to distinguish us? Limbering,
I strike out on my own. And nearness...
Apostrophes, anticlimaxes, apogees...

It's a sport to listen, here, someone is coming,
Approaching without a clear personality.
Yet the goal is to approximate expression
On the fullness of experience, irony plays
Out its full hand, vagueness with a full leer.
No one can take it back, not even that little girl

With the leaflets in her hand. Perhaps Celan
inhabits me or Vallejo with his brusque voice
Or Gertrude Stein in all her mathematical precision,
Where will I go to hide from them?
Am I too old to get rid of Stevens?
Even Bloom is a thorn in my side.

She takes the pages and spreads them apart.
They twinkle and this is arresting.
Peer pressure and a comic interlude regarding
The Sun mooning and the earth giving in.
There are simple ways to put this in academic terms.
But that is all so much resistance, so much outside, so much *wiederstand*

Forgiven.Then read. Then return. Then speak.
The point is to disappear while learning to complain,
And *they* translate the alphabet. And *you*
Want to understand them? In a month?
What will you call them and how will you reach them,
Like patience, "where does it grow and who will eat it?"
Maybe, by now, it can be absorbed and alleviated.

I dreaded their pain so I learned to fabricate
Distance in the hands of a sunny disposition.
There were geographical puzzles, but few minded this either,
As long as the map to the subway was clear.
But not even nothing is completely transparent.

So no one need struggle to induce symbolism.
Yet vocabulary, of itself, debilitates.
We yearn to forget and to hear again,
To repeat and mistake again, to forgive
And deduce again, to greet and prepare again.

Words worry me, and they too are wearing thin again
in their sympathy for me.

*

Death is not "far away."
It is space. It is air.
We breathe it. It eats us.
All invisibly. Not sorrowfully.
Not yet. Is the breaking
But not broken. Is the clashing
But not the pieces. Is one.
We are two.
Still, saying nothing at all,
Said nothing, says nothing.
it is nothing. Is nothing.
But it won't
Let go.
(1/13/93)
*

"Even stones have a love. A love that seeks the ground."
Meister Eckhart

Mother takes you into her arms
A central image
But also a deep feeling
A throbbing at the center of being
You know how to keep quiet about it
But you also know how to moan it and cry it and even scream it
Mother! O mother! Oh my mother!
Father up there on the cross
And me, infant me
Deep in my throbbing pleasure
Deep in the throbbing satisfaction of mother's arms
Shadow and veils, bending over in a hood,
Smile and holding, shape and shadow,
Arms and, hand and gleaming eyes and streaming hair,
Light in the eyes, and sometimes sorrow
And sometimes screaming, screaming and crying like an infant herself,
Exploding outwards in evanescent shapes or fragments
The rage that through me back in terror,
That took me like an earthquake and hurricane winds,
And lifted me high and shattered me against the wall,
Tiny pieces breaking apart into memories,
Pain smashing my pleasure in two,
Hands held against the face in tears,
Arms finding nowhere to fall back,
Eyes closed in hurt and darkness,
Hands bunched against the body falling at you,
Heart clenched against the love slipping away,
Making room for fear and coldness,
Loneliness and dread, aching and shivering
O her shimmering eyes
O the softness of her soft cheeks
O the pillow of her soothing words,
Uttered into the confusion of the world coming at me
On a million confused circuits
Spinning my thoughts into a billion necessary tasks
And a trillion answers to a trillion questions
No one ever heard, even me in my most silent dreams
Could never recognize with any absolute certainty
The words used to utter them.

How could she have thrown me from such heights
Into such completely deep agonizing doubts
Into such a condition of loneliness
Into such an absence of her, in my hatred of anger,
That somewhere deep inside that rage and sorrow
I planted and planned my escape
What could be more frightening then the free fall from love
Into the abyss below mother's holding arms?

In the same way that parts of the physical universe are attracted to each other,
Parts of the human being are attracted to each other
There are two languages, if you will,
For the same process. Is it possible
That just as human beings ultimately derive their existences
From the physical universe, thought is derived
From the physical beings of humans,
To exist in a separate universe where it ultimately joins
Other thoughts which now interact with each other in a separate dimension
To build their own structures and travel,
Meeting each other unconstridctedlly,
Opening energies not containable
When within the mind?

Thought curled up inside the pages of books
And canvas.

*

"Farewell to an idea...The mother's face,
The purpose of the poem fills the room."

Wallace Stevens *The Auroras of Autumn*

(1/21/94)

9/13/93

Reading Wobbling
Words do not allow you to attend to the specifics of the author's ego
The relationship to music
A (re)connection of the relationship between
words and music that does not require
the mechanics of creating sound
incidental sounds and thoughts become part of
the music
instead of comprehension-reading
raw reading- unrefined
"classless" categoryless reading
Valery quote in The Outlook for
Intelligence-poems made from words-not ideas
Relief from the inexorable rule of
one thing follows from another-
from discipline as an ordering principle
from completion as an ordering principal
relief from the literal, from the symbolic
from the puzzle
akin to the contemplation of constellations-
constellations without names
Return to the undifferentiated
the sea, forests of trees
"natural" in *that* sense

p.60 "knowledge was numbered now
Argument vinegar"
I'm feeling I understand this criticique of
pointed, but useless, specificity

Holding, retaliation and interpretation
Associations: I thought either I
saw something repugnant in that woman
(fair and browning blonde hair and stout)
or the dog read my thoughts and atttacked
me for it. 4 injections and more to come.

Aggression and retaliation- two cling
together in deep dissatisfaction,mutual
criticism and repugnance- they are
not through with each other
until each feels the lesson has
been taught

It was amazing how quickly that dog
came out of nowhere to attack me when
I thought that critical thoought about that
woman. Or is it the dog's simple
minded way of agreeing with me?

You hold on to be taught and use
the transitional object as a supporting
object so the holding can be continuous.

Imagination and the holding environment
the area of play in the cultural experience

Holding the dictionary says:
This is the closest thing we have
to a bible.

Chairs: the interpreter in the High
Bench- the writer in the dock, the
publisher is the lawyer and History is the
prosecutor.The jury are the readers.
The audience watches it on
television and talks about it during
the breaks.

9/19/93

Definition of the aritist's domain:
wild West of the imagination
where anyone can stake a claim

"It is impossible to exagerrate the importance that Paul Valery had for Rilke during the last five or six years of his life. His letters and conversations were full of the impressions which had received from Valery. What struck him most, because it touched him at his most vulnerable spot, was the the French poet only came into the open with his poetry after a silence lasting many years. How he approved, how he praised such a silence, in which the work of art could grow and ripen slowly, imperceptibly, hidden from the world! And how that silence justified his own silence, before he was able to break it at Muzot."

J.R. von Salis, Rainer Maria Rilke: The Years In Switzerland, UC Press, 1966

"I am unpacking my library. Yes, I am. The books are not yet on the shelves, not yet touched by the mild boredom of order. I cannot march up and down their ranks to pass them in review before a friendly audience. You need not fear any of that. Instead, I must ask you to join me in the disorder of crates that have been wrenched open, the air saturated with the dust of wood, the floor covered with torn paper, to join me among piles of volumes that are seeing daylight again after two years of darkness, so that you may be ready to share with me a bit of the mood- it is certainly not an elegaic mood but, rather, one of anticipation-which these books arouse in a genuine collector. For such a man speaking to you, and on closer scrutiny he proves to be speaking only about himself. Would it not be presumptuous of me if, in order to appear convincingly objective and down-to-earth I ennumerated for you the main sections or prize pieces of a library, if I presented you with their history or even their usefulness to a writer? I, for one, have in mind something less obscure, something more palpable than that; what I am really concerned with is giving you some insight into the relationship of a book collector to his possessions, into collecting rather than a collection. If I do this by elaborating on the various ways of acquiring books, this is something entirely arbitrary. This or any other procedure is merely a dam against the spring tide of memories which surges toward any collector as he contemplates his pssessions. Every passion borders of the chaotic, but the collector's passion borders on the chaos of memories. More than that: the chance, the fate, that suffuse the past before my eyes are conspicuously present in the accustomed confusion of these books. For what else is this collection but a disorder to which habit has accomodated itself to such an extent that it can appear as order?"

Walter Benjamin, "Unpacking My Library," *Illuminations*

December, 1976 (Written as an unsent letter to a friend)
"Even the most boring type of book discoverable in the literature of the past is never wholly dead. It will come back- if only as an antidote to the boredom that the most exciting type will end up by inducing."
Valery- Analects

These thoughts of Valery continue to excite me. He says "What's needed is to have the energy one day to pick up the book we regard as boring, order it to *exist*, and try to recapture the interest the author took in it." Also- "False 'depth' I loathe, but neither do I greatly relish the true variety. 'Depth' in literature is the outcome of a special technique; one kind of effect among many, procured by one of the many possible techniques. You have only to see how a book of "thoughts" is manufactured ("deep thoughts," I mean).

What does it matter whether that lake is twenty inches deep or twenty thousand fathoms? It is the surface sheen that fascinates us."

He was able to spell out the subtleties of the art of making poetry. Pick up those thoughts that are obvious difficulties that come up when you write poetry- really he sees what makes it magic, "slick," he really has a slick mind. His comments are like good Warholisms. The remark about depth reminds me of what you and I like best.

"The martyr: 'I'd rather die than think it over.'"

What really gets me is how I'll remember all these things I've thought about writing as I read those comments. I think one of the beautiful things about writing that acknowledges the "boredom" of reading includes a lot of irony and detachment from words. Who wants to pin them on their objects like playing pin the tail on the donkey with your eyes blindfolded?As Andy (I wrote "any") Warhol said "So what" All writing contains a lot of 'so what' but the writers go on like wise professorial baboons saying things. Hey- isn't "any" a great word, especially if you think of it as a thing? Anything. He also writes: "Conspiracy. It would be nice to bring together all the people for whom we think and to whom we dedicate, within ourselves, our best ideas." "A literary work should be a monument to such a 'gathering of the clan'"
What can I say? You should get the book- incredible. You'd love what he says about proselytizing- I wish I had the energy to write a lot of it out- I'll write out as many as I can.

I have a feeling that all my study of Rilke made Valery so exciting for me. Probably related to Rilke's love of Valery's work- see book on Rilke in Switzerland- a lot of Valery.

I can't find the playbill now, and will post more information later, but "Door Wide Open" the Joyce Johnson play about Jack Kerouac based on her letters to and from him from 1957-1958 is a must see! directed by Tony Torn and produced by Rip Torn now at the Bowery Poetry Club. Thanks again to Bob Holman for making this terrific work and so much other great stuff available.The Bowery Poetry Club is a hit! Good coffee and a great bar too!

4/10/76

...the sense that she's observing me all the time and making criticisms. The threat to me is that she might desert me. I am afraid of the silence...Constructing the sentence involves examining the root thought (contained in words) but holding the whole thought and elaborating on the associations- adding in the details. My imagination produces a series of words- usually a phrase which is an abbreviation for the entire thought. When I "copy" these out I write "grammatically" incomplete sentences. But should or can the thought be used as it is- is there always something in the ordinary thoughts or should these be somewhat inaccessible, be presented in some way that blocks access. It's true that I word very slow. So that the method I use is very slow. But I am now changing this- recognizing how I might use various materials. The collage is a similar venture.

Since relationships occupy so much of my energy and most people's energy they must be incorporated- this is what is lacking in Valery. It isn't a question of privacy, discretion but I think the true problem is that it is difficult. D plans to write about friendship. This is close to the mark. We are silent about relationships because they are always so crucial. This is the attraction of the solitary man. Moment to moment in the presence of others we are experiencing ourselves as mixtures of qualities. Alone, these qualities feel different to us. Writing is writing about the sense of others' presences when they are not presences.So that there must be remembering. But what I am now is also what I am in relation to others. My style in relation to others. What part of my thought (the tone, the attitude, the stance) shows what this relationship to the other is? If I can find that I can use that awareness to write about relationships. I want to examine how someone else deals with, manages their relationships. I want to imagine this.

I spoke with Katie Degentesh right before her reading (poor thing, she was trying to eat her dinner) and asked her what she thought about the fact that some of our favorite blogger friends, like David Hess and Stephanie Young are getting won right over to New York due to her popular Bloggedy Blog Blog. Katie talked about the skills you need to survive a walk down a New York City street. I said I thought her blog captured the gritty moments that can't be so easily supplied by one's imagination based on previous visits here. One could easily summon up memories of the St Mark's Bookstore or the Poetry Project, but Katie's terrific tableaux supply some of that unique flavor of those passing conversations that seemingly could only happen here. Katie read from her blog some and read some poems that astonished me for their insight into how words as objects stand in for meaning more than we ever think they could. In one piece she rings so many changes on the word "popsicle" I could only compare hearing this (Drew Gardner would appreciate this) to a complex solo by, say, John Coltrane, in his unforgettable rendition of "Aisha." Douglas Rothschild recalled one of Katie's readings at the Zinc bar when she arrived in an all silver outfit that well befitted her poems which he described as "shining." This was pretty good considering the fact that Douglas-in between sneezes- left his intro to her reading on the Staten Island Ferry. Will it wash up on the shores of the Upper West Side like a message in a bottle, like he said? You never know...

(3/30/76)

I expected
something and hoped for- something will come.
You gave me something, she sings, but she
didn't say what it is. If I learn, I'll
never come back. Rock and roll, I won't go,
is taking my man away.

You gotta work to live. It's a struggle,
my friend gave me that. I wanted something.
He said you just sit down and do it- he gave
me a gift. We're all waiting fo rthe
song.Tragically backing away from the past.
looking back anxiously and sadly, every moment
prismatically dividing into a spectrum of
feelings. How were we to piece them together so
rapidly, feelings imploding so silently.

Equally tragic- money and luck. Place the
sad emphasis on any word- even the gold
can be shaped into a knife.
We want soft things to live among. The
hard things are dangerous. I move towards them
ambiguously, obliquely. I don't stop. I stop
to rest. There are still sounds. I can't take
away that pain. You will have more thoughts,
of a trance. Continuing. Waves and waves.
Where it moves towards.

My friend lets me be. When he's my philosophical
uncle. The ego. Ago, I'm reading and the
world's my uncle- out goes a word.


I'm thinking abou the world's my uncle. "I want to be alone" a secret annotation.
A figure mingling in our presence. Divided.

3/28/76

Dream of a boy. He wrote a poem in red based on bible myths- one of the myths was of a place which was like a vacuum where people couldn't speak or hear. I explain to a woman that I've read his poems and am impressed by the using of the bible in this way. He is a young boy (maybe 12). I can't remember what he looks like. I sit beside him and it is a very warm feeling. I feel happy doing this. He shows me his poems.They are beautiful. But when I explain it to the woman she is critical- the poems are old. (Actually this would make it more impressive since he would be even younger when he wrote them).

I go for a ride to pick up Whimsy. I pick her up at a house. There's mail for me- tiny letter from D, another small thing. I put Whimsy in a cab with two people, a couple, in it. Joking with the cabdriver about a word (for a homeless dog?)
(3/28/76)

What could be simpler
I waited and waited
For endless time
Nothing was happening
It's true I heard noises
Some of them music
Breathing and sighing
no one new came

One night I saw movies
and at a great distance
Someone told me a secret.
Then a few stairs
and long winding hair.

Excitement is mystery
Movement is frightening
Red leotards
and open gray eyes
Drunk on laughter we
gulped down the days
My life had changed
I forgot I was living

Gold is for rich men
and I was still poor
I saved only memories
you are their alchemist

I sometimes go outside
I always return
to my chair and my dog
and my slow empty breathing

But I'll never forget
your mysterious offering
I'd trade all my gold
for your priceless uncertainty

3/30/76

And what is this real world-

Exists in a surround
tiresome boring and wonderful

by a slight change in form
as if that which was contained
taking away and giving back
an event which ocurred. A detail
included in a moment of concentration, I am
accepting the every aspect of self,
one approached and drew back , they ocurred
relatively fast or slow; one wanted the past
it wasn't shaped in any particular way-
there were so many ways of going about it.
Put two and two together.

There was more . A person may be dying.
We move to the hospital. Feeling strangely
amid life and death.

Words by the lack of words I add to the world.
I'm thinking about B. From dead to living.

What do I want from him?