The Last Novel
David Markson's newest book, *The Last Novel* is just out from Shoemaker Hoard. Except for a few hours work, and dinner, I was unable to close this book, yesterday, the same day I purchased it, until the last word. It is unquestionably one of Markson's greatest works, an incandescent, elegiac, gnomic masterpiece, satirically and hilariously critical of human stupidity and cruelty, yet passionately, reverently and knowledgeably reflective of human brilliance and accomplishment throughout history. His other works include *Wittgenstein's Mistress*, *Reader's Block* and *This is Not a Novel*.
A few tidbits:
"He who writes artistically dies without recognition or reward.
Complained Lope de Vega- in 1609"
"Our father who art in heaven/Stay there.
Requested Jacques Prevert."
"I am no Einstein.
Once said Einstein."
"It's later than you know.
Printed Baudelaire on the face of his clock- after having broken off its hands."
Distribution Automatique
Thursday, April 5
Are Those Rag Dolls Lying There in the Poet's Corner?
Wait a minute...they're all standing up...they've got their arms out...they're walking towards me...
Tom Beckett's Little Book of Zombie Poems designed by Mark Young
**************************************
"The academy of my dreams is opening its doors..."
(Ted Berrigan)
In my dream last night I was in the subway looking for Uijongbu. I try to call somebody from the dark platform but two tough guys start to approach me. When I woke up I remembered where the word was from and then I had a very strong, sad feeling of missing Ted.
I remembered this:
"It is 8:54 a.m. in Brooklyn it's the 28th of July and
it's probably 8:54 in Manhattan but I'm
in Brooklyn I'm eating English Muffins and drinking
pepsi and I'm thinking of how Brooklyn is New
York city too how odd I usually think of it as
something all its own like Bellows Falls like Little
Chute like Uijongbu"
-Ted Berrigan's *Sonnets* (Grove Press, 1964)
I looked up Ted Berrigan in the Wikipedia. It turns out Ted served in the army during the Korean war.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ted Berrigan (15 November 1934 - 4 July 1983) was an American poet.
Berrigan was born in Providence, Rhode Island, on November 15, 1934. After high school, he spent a year at Providence College before joining the U.S. Army in 1954 to serve in the Korean War. After three years in the Army, he finished his college studies at the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma, where he received a B.A. in English in 1959. He received his M.A. from Tulsa in 1962. Berrigan was married to Sandy Berrigan, also a poet, and they had two children, David Berrigan and Kate Berrigan. He and his second wife the poet Alice Notley were active in the poetry scene in Chicago for several years, then moved to New York City, where he edited various magazines and books.
Uijeongbu
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Uijeongbu is a city in Gyeonggi Province, South Korea. Its geographical location is 37°45′N 127°3′E.
The city is located just north of Seoul with many U.S. and Korean military bases for the defense of the Korean capital. The U.S. Second Infantry Division has established its headquarters in the city with main troops deployed in Dongducheon City.
In M*A*S*H, this city (then just a village) served as the home of MASH 4077.
Wait a minute...they're all standing up...they've got their arms out...they're walking towards me...
Tom Beckett's Little Book of Zombie Poems designed by Mark Young
**************************************
"The academy of my dreams is opening its doors..."
(Ted Berrigan)
In my dream last night I was in the subway looking for Uijongbu. I try to call somebody from the dark platform but two tough guys start to approach me. When I woke up I remembered where the word was from and then I had a very strong, sad feeling of missing Ted.
I remembered this:
"It is 8:54 a.m. in Brooklyn it's the 28th of July and
it's probably 8:54 in Manhattan but I'm
in Brooklyn I'm eating English Muffins and drinking
pepsi and I'm thinking of how Brooklyn is New
York city too how odd I usually think of it as
something all its own like Bellows Falls like Little
Chute like Uijongbu"
-Ted Berrigan's *Sonnets* (Grove Press, 1964)
I looked up Ted Berrigan in the Wikipedia. It turns out Ted served in the army during the Korean war.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ted Berrigan (15 November 1934 - 4 July 1983) was an American poet.
Berrigan was born in Providence, Rhode Island, on November 15, 1934. After high school, he spent a year at Providence College before joining the U.S. Army in 1954 to serve in the Korean War. After three years in the Army, he finished his college studies at the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma, where he received a B.A. in English in 1959. He received his M.A. from Tulsa in 1962. Berrigan was married to Sandy Berrigan, also a poet, and they had two children, David Berrigan and Kate Berrigan. He and his second wife the poet Alice Notley were active in the poetry scene in Chicago for several years, then moved to New York City, where he edited various magazines and books.
Uijeongbu
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Uijeongbu is a city in Gyeonggi Province, South Korea. Its geographical location is 37°45′N 127°3′E.
The city is located just north of Seoul with many U.S. and Korean military bases for the defense of the Korean capital. The U.S. Second Infantry Division has established its headquarters in the city with main troops deployed in Dongducheon City.
In M*A*S*H, this city (then just a village) served as the home of MASH 4077.
Wednesday, April 4
Contradicta
When intrusion becomes a right all other rights lack teeth.
*
********************************
I don't care much for birthdays or most holidays. That every day is assigned a number, a first name and a surname, and every moment labelled with another number provides more than enough temporal bureaucracy for me.
When intrusion becomes a right all other rights lack teeth.
*
********************************
I don't care much for birthdays or most holidays. That every day is assigned a number, a first name and a surname, and every moment labelled with another number provides more than enough temporal bureaucracy for me.
Monday, April 2
*Folly* on the Roof
Nada Gordon's new book from Roof Books,*Folly* was celebrated yesterday at the home of the publisher, James Sherry. Terrific performances were offered by Sharon Mesmer (who "roasted" Nada with Henny Youngman type witticisms), Mitch Highfill, Marianne Shaneen, Brenda IIjima, Gary Sullivan, Katie Degentesh and Nada herself joined in to read from the book, which features a knockout cover by Gary Sullivan, with assistance from Nada herself. The room was filled with huge smiles, delighted laughter, and palpable excitement about Nada's new book, some good food and, from what I could tell, some damn fine wine as well.
At one point, James Sherry and Nada read from a funny and fascinating "process" dialogue based on emails the two wrote to each other during the editing stage of the book. Toward the end of the party, James and Deborah reminisced that this was among one of the most terrific book parties ever given in the loft. I agreed, having attended events there to celebrate Roof and Segue books since the late seventies. Other Roof book writers in attendence were Charles Bernstein, Susan Bee, Abigail Child, Kim Rosenfield and Drew Gardner. Other luminaries present included Ann Tardos, KIm Lyons, Toni Simon, Deborah Thomas, Douglas Rorhschild, Bill Marsh and Octavia Butler, Michael Scharf and no doubt many others I have yet to meet!
This was a weekend of book parties (David Shapiro, Elaine Equi [see link to photo below], Nada Gordon) I will long remember. I have a lot of poetry to read, some new, and some I have long admired, that I will without doubt hugely enjoy.
Nada Gordon's new book from Roof Books,*Folly* was celebrated yesterday at the home of the publisher, James Sherry. Terrific performances were offered by Sharon Mesmer (who "roasted" Nada with Henny Youngman type witticisms), Mitch Highfill, Marianne Shaneen, Brenda IIjima, Gary Sullivan, Katie Degentesh and Nada herself joined in to read from the book, which features a knockout cover by Gary Sullivan, with assistance from Nada herself. The room was filled with huge smiles, delighted laughter, and palpable excitement about Nada's new book, some good food and, from what I could tell, some damn fine wine as well.
At one point, James Sherry and Nada read from a funny and fascinating "process" dialogue based on emails the two wrote to each other during the editing stage of the book. Toward the end of the party, James and Deborah reminisced that this was among one of the most terrific book parties ever given in the loft. I agreed, having attended events there to celebrate Roof and Segue books since the late seventies. Other Roof book writers in attendence were Charles Bernstein, Susan Bee, Abigail Child, Kim Rosenfield and Drew Gardner. Other luminaries present included Ann Tardos, KIm Lyons, Toni Simon, Deborah Thomas, Douglas Rorhschild, Bill Marsh and Octavia Butler, Michael Scharf and no doubt many others I have yet to meet!
This was a weekend of book parties (David Shapiro, Elaine Equi [see link to photo below], Nada Gordon) I will long remember. I have a lot of poetry to read, some new, and some I have long admired, that I will without doubt hugely enjoy.
Sunday, April 1
Celebrating Elaine Equi's *Ripple Effect*, New and Selected Poems
a photo by
Star Black
Charles Bernstein, Stephen-Paul Miller, Bob Perelman, Bill Zavatsky,
Meredith Walters, Francie Shaw, Toni Simon, Nick Piombino,
Susan Bee, Elaine Equi, Jerome Sala
(via Charles Bernstein's Web Log)
a photo by
Star Black
Charles Bernstein, Stephen-Paul Miller, Bob Perelman, Bill Zavatsky,
Meredith Walters, Francie Shaw, Toni Simon, Nick Piombino,
Susan Bee, Elaine Equi, Jerome Sala
(via Charles Bernstein's Web Log)
Contradicta
Through all of our suffering, existence itself shines above it like a star.
*********************************
What is known to every object and every living thing in the world except human beings is how to be at rest.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Big Bridge Feature: Your New Face-
Poet/Artist Collaborations
Through all of our suffering, existence itself shines above it like a star.
*********************************
What is known to every object and every living thing in the world except human beings is how to be at rest.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Big Bridge Feature: Your New Face-
Poet/Artist Collaborations
Saturday, March 31
Tony Scott dies
Toni and I are saddened today by the death this week of the great jazzman, Tony Scott who played his sax and clarinet on a number of classic Billy Holiday songs, creator of *Music for Zen Meditation* and many other great albums. He was Toni's namesake, having been discovered by Toni's father Bill Simon, who he roomed with in the early days of his career. He will be greatly missed. He lived in Rome in the latter part of his life, and is survived by his wife Cinzia, who lives in Rome, two daughters and a grandchild.
NY Times Obit for Tony Scott
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Elaine Equi's reading at Cue last night was a joy. Check out the rave review for her book of new and selected poems *Ripple Effect* in the Sunday NY Times Book Review The Air is Full of Secrets
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
This is a week of poem dedications. Here is one Norman Fischer wrote a while back and sent to me today.
Writing out directions to the location
Is a monument accompanied by drums
Persuaded by the daily round to search for
Any hour to take seriously,
Mining the very thoughtfulness
Finally for something here to holler at – or on –
Of bills to be paid, the settled wonder of words
That are debts, in places, numbers on a page
Lit up and constantly fading or morphing
Into higher and lower figures, going after
The unsayable, going away in a huff –
Some other day there’s another way
In the middle, very exhausted, an assortment
Of pains for your delectation, comfort
Of being alive. Sauntering down Light Street
Or in the park conversing passionately
Is there anything determined under the sun?
A gathering of poets huddled on the pavement
Is a simulation of interested practice
A preservation of the evolving species
That has co-oped the absolute in sputterings
Of exalted speech
(for Nick Piombino)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Toni and I are saddened today by the death this week of the great jazzman, Tony Scott who played his sax and clarinet on a number of classic Billy Holiday songs, creator of *Music for Zen Meditation* and many other great albums. He was Toni's namesake, having been discovered by Toni's father Bill Simon, who he roomed with in the early days of his career. He will be greatly missed. He lived in Rome in the latter part of his life, and is survived by his wife Cinzia, who lives in Rome, two daughters and a grandchild.
NY Times Obit for Tony Scott
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Elaine Equi's reading at Cue last night was a joy. Check out the rave review for her book of new and selected poems *Ripple Effect* in the Sunday NY Times Book Review The Air is Full of Secrets
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
This is a week of poem dedications. Here is one Norman Fischer wrote a while back and sent to me today.
Writing out directions to the location
Is a monument accompanied by drums
Persuaded by the daily round to search for
Any hour to take seriously,
Mining the very thoughtfulness
Finally for something here to holler at – or on –
Of bills to be paid, the settled wonder of words
That are debts, in places, numbers on a page
Lit up and constantly fading or morphing
Into higher and lower figures, going after
The unsayable, going away in a huff –
Some other day there’s another way
In the middle, very exhausted, an assortment
Of pains for your delectation, comfort
Of being alive. Sauntering down Light Street
Or in the park conversing passionately
Is there anything determined under the sun?
A gathering of poets huddled on the pavement
Is a simulation of interested practice
A preservation of the evolving species
That has co-oped the absolute in sputterings
Of exalted speech
(for Nick Piombino)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Friday, March 30
No Ledge
a dedicated poem from
Mark Young (gamma ways)
**********************
time March's on
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 01:32:04 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <[log in to unmask]>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <[log in to unmask]>
From: Nick Piombino <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Start an Argument on the Buffalo List
Content-type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"
Blaming the blogosphere for what is lacking on the poetics list is an old tradition,(old in internet-time) and sounds to these old poet's ears like a cry of pain. This is not unusual from Mr. Sondheim, whose precision of perception is not the least bit
lost on a great number of poets, despite its many fascinating, complex camouflages.
What a poet needs, especially a long distance marathon poetry runner, is response. Some say there is never enough response for an artist, and that might be true, especially for those who crave the energizing, potentially infinitely expanding cycle of signal and response between artist and audience.
It may sadden, alarm and confuse some to hear, given its tawdry, tinny surfaces, that this is exactly what is delighting and challenging many writers in Blogland. But the cycle (of signal land response), that is occurring in this situation is unlike any that has ever existed before, in the world of letters, it seems to me, and is not at all subsumed under the model shaped by the cycle of argument and debate, the taste for which is no doubt being stimulated (for some) by the pathetically tired old
clichéd debates now going on in the mostly false and fraudulent US election process: another kind of Academy Award ceremony that is not even funny anymore.
Though many realize all of this movie academy and election academy sturm and drang is almost completely devoid of meaning (not significance, of course), does not prevent the emergence of the mentally stimulating, imagination-
appetizing aspects of the spectacle of debate, an ancient mode of provoking the discovery and identification of greatness. But this election process is the clearest proof of Guy Debord's theories anybody could ever want to see. The Society of the Spectacle is beyond crisis; it is moribund.
Can I wonder aloud if this argument and debate method of exchanging knowledge and inducing change, discovering truth, and uncovering greatness is totally bankrupt? What might replace it? What could replace it?
Something is happening in Blogland and you don't know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones?
affectionate regards to my list friends and literary comrades,
Nick Piombino
a dedicated poem from
Mark Young (gamma ways)
**********************
time March's on
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 01:32:04 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <[log in to unmask]>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <[log in to unmask]>
From: Nick Piombino <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Start an Argument on the Buffalo List
Content-type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"
Blaming the blogosphere for what is lacking on the poetics list is an old tradition,(old in internet-time) and sounds to these old poet's ears like a cry of pain. This is not unusual from Mr. Sondheim, whose precision of perception is not the least bit
lost on a great number of poets, despite its many fascinating, complex camouflages.
What a poet needs, especially a long distance marathon poetry runner, is response. Some say there is never enough response for an artist, and that might be true, especially for those who crave the energizing, potentially infinitely expanding cycle of signal and response between artist and audience.
It may sadden, alarm and confuse some to hear, given its tawdry, tinny surfaces, that this is exactly what is delighting and challenging many writers in Blogland. But the cycle (of signal land response), that is occurring in this situation is unlike any that has ever existed before, in the world of letters, it seems to me, and is not at all subsumed under the model shaped by the cycle of argument and debate, the taste for which is no doubt being stimulated (for some) by the pathetically tired old
clichéd debates now going on in the mostly false and fraudulent US election process: another kind of Academy Award ceremony that is not even funny anymore.
Though many realize all of this movie academy and election academy sturm and drang is almost completely devoid of meaning (not significance, of course), does not prevent the emergence of the mentally stimulating, imagination-
appetizing aspects of the spectacle of debate, an ancient mode of provoking the discovery and identification of greatness. But this election process is the clearest proof of Guy Debord's theories anybody could ever want to see. The Society of the Spectacle is beyond crisis; it is moribund.
Can I wonder aloud if this argument and debate method of exchanging knowledge and inducing change, discovering truth, and uncovering greatness is totally bankrupt? What might replace it? What could replace it?
Something is happening in Blogland and you don't know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones?
affectionate regards to my list friends and literary comrades,
Nick Piombino
Thursday, March 29
Contradicta
Those who never ask you questions have decided on all the answers for themselves, answers your future conversations will never change.
**********************
No time to waste, no time to taste.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Drew Gardner reviews Bob Perelman's recent BPC Reading
Overlap
****************
Those who never ask you questions have decided on all the answers for themselves, answers your future conversations will never change.
**********************
No time to waste, no time to taste.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Drew Gardner reviews Bob Perelman's recent BPC Reading
Overlap
****************
Tuesday, March 27
Sunday, March 25
Close Listening/PS 1 Readings and Interviews
Alan Davies (reading from his new chapbook), Ann Lauterbach, Richard Tuttle, Mimi Gross and many
others chat with Charles Bernstein and read online
***********
I Can't Wait
to read, in their entirety, two books I just received and very pleasurably dipped into. Tom Beckett's *Unprotected Texts*
(Meritage Press, 2006) and Mark Young's *the allgrezza ficcione* (Otoliths,
2006)
Tom Beckett: "Poetry is relationships. That's my naked truth."
Mark Young: "There was also a book by Ptolemy, that seemed to be made up of footnotes to another work of his, a kind of growing self-doubt about his own beliefs, that finishes with a small poem:
The
Sun- the
Universe's true centre?"
Alan Davies (reading from his new chapbook), Ann Lauterbach, Richard Tuttle, Mimi Gross and many
others chat with Charles Bernstein and read online
***********
I Can't Wait
to read, in their entirety, two books I just received and very pleasurably dipped into. Tom Beckett's *Unprotected Texts*
(Meritage Press, 2006) and Mark Young's *the allgrezza ficcione* (Otoliths,
2006)
Tom Beckett: "Poetry is relationships. That's my naked truth."
Mark Young: "There was also a book by Ptolemy, that seemed to be made up of footnotes to another work of his, a kind of growing self-doubt about his own beliefs, that finishes with a small poem:
The
Sun- the
Universe's true centre?"
Friday, March 23
King of The Brooklyn School
Like the fabled NY School of old, Amy King's new *I'M THE MAN Who Loves You* (Blaze/Vox) is unafraid of the everyday, pausing to notice and respond to the presence of others and things, passing on the strained lyricism of soap opera surrealism. I don't know if this work is really a manifestation of an emerging school, but I did go to school immediately on its quick fencer's wit and steady, yet verbally lucious focus on the realities, pleasures and perplexities of ongoing experience. I can't help it, like Amy, I've fallen in love with the real world of things and people. How can she have mastered this so early, when for most, youth is wasted on the Jung and other inflated idealisms. It's not only a pleasure, but an actual relief to see daily moments become remarkable again without becoming either flaccid or hysterical. Don't screech at me, don't preach at me and please pass the breadsticks:
"I had been invisible, untrained disappearing off the grid
for some time, until you asked me to pass the breadsticks
in that split moment of schizo-panic. To give up
a technicolor coat is a brave tragedy with many layers;
we're drawn to any labyrinth, perfection at the center
of artistry..." (*HOW TO GET THERE*)
But this poetry definitively is not about corny, not-so-new age glommy affirmations either. No interest in
"Accordion adventures they're the best instrument
to windbag, to bleat, to push air through daisies
for an alphabet's sake. Androgyny and honesty
ought to play frozen roses on apocalyptic landscapes,
the landscape of Amy King's face fused
with artifical intelligence on which hers lies
infinitely predictable.Blindfolded books could do worse
than the diction of bedtime verse"
So much for stretched out poetry gimmicks and ceaseless and shameless self-promotion. If we're going to be childish, at least lets attempt be a little like actual children. That's cool. So, what *are* you interested in, Amy?
"...but
lately I'm craving minimum cravings, dusty old records
that smell like a wood-paneled basement,
posters of Elvis on velvet, and the evolution
of ethnic foods on the Lower East Side.
We've gone from Indian to Choctaw.
Eccentric is out." (*MINIATURE DISASTERS*)
I get a whiff of Kim Lyons here, and a dash of Sharon Mesmer there, with a sprinkle of Nada Gordon : maybe that's where I got the Brooklyn School idea, though I'm not claiming literal influences,
there's Kim's: "Who doesn't hear Robert Johnson
at this place
near King's Highway" (*Saline*)
or
"plastic infinite waterfall
the matched "Danish* living room "set" (*Saline*)
or Nada's: "the
lamb chop in the dryer,
the snow shovel
in the rumpus room, thinking
if i had a round horse" (*GORGEOUS*a vestibule* from *V. IMP.*)
Well, anyway, the basement's where the imagination is sometimes forced to hide, especially in Brooklyn, my teen years Brooklyn of Bay Ridge,at my parent's house on BR Parkway, with its cement floor cnvered in outdated technology and turn-of-the-century French magazines.
Sure, I pledge allegiance to the books and the language of America as much as the next gal, but after all, the way hour follows hour and day follows day is not that much like a vocabulary exercise; it's more about trying not to get depressed, even trying to renew not just your library card. but this ceaselessly ironic daily life.
OK, not easy but not pathetic either, if there's hope in the rarely automatic quotidian promises of life:
at least that's what I'm getting from Amy King today.
"On top of my name, devotions, no woman
chain whips and lovers: coffee is how
I get other/ countries inside my body." (*ON THE OUNCE THAT SELLS US OUT*)
and:
"Marilyn as metaphor is
applepie modeled on
the grandmothers of invention" (*THE TEMPERATURE'S MOVIE LIFE*)
Am I not THAT old afterall?
Thanks, Amy.
Like the fabled NY School of old, Amy King's new *I'M THE MAN Who Loves You* (Blaze/Vox) is unafraid of the everyday, pausing to notice and respond to the presence of others and things, passing on the strained lyricism of soap opera surrealism. I don't know if this work is really a manifestation of an emerging school, but I did go to school immediately on its quick fencer's wit and steady, yet verbally lucious focus on the realities, pleasures and perplexities of ongoing experience. I can't help it, like Amy, I've fallen in love with the real world of things and people. How can she have mastered this so early, when for most, youth is wasted on the Jung and other inflated idealisms. It's not only a pleasure, but an actual relief to see daily moments become remarkable again without becoming either flaccid or hysterical. Don't screech at me, don't preach at me and please pass the breadsticks:
"I had been invisible, untrained disappearing off the grid
for some time, until you asked me to pass the breadsticks
in that split moment of schizo-panic. To give up
a technicolor coat is a brave tragedy with many layers;
we're drawn to any labyrinth, perfection at the center
of artistry..." (*HOW TO GET THERE*)
But this poetry definitively is not about corny, not-so-new age glommy affirmations either. No interest in
"Accordion adventures they're the best instrument
to windbag, to bleat, to push air through daisies
for an alphabet's sake. Androgyny and honesty
ought to play frozen roses on apocalyptic landscapes,
the landscape of Amy King's face fused
with artifical intelligence on which hers lies
infinitely predictable.Blindfolded books could do worse
than the diction of bedtime verse"
So much for stretched out poetry gimmicks and ceaseless and shameless self-promotion. If we're going to be childish, at least lets attempt be a little like actual children. That's cool. So, what *are* you interested in, Amy?
"...but
lately I'm craving minimum cravings, dusty old records
that smell like a wood-paneled basement,
posters of Elvis on velvet, and the evolution
of ethnic foods on the Lower East Side.
We've gone from Indian to Choctaw.
Eccentric is out." (*MINIATURE DISASTERS*)
I get a whiff of Kim Lyons here, and a dash of Sharon Mesmer there, with a sprinkle of Nada Gordon : maybe that's where I got the Brooklyn School idea, though I'm not claiming literal influences,
there's Kim's: "Who doesn't hear Robert Johnson
at this place
near King's Highway" (*Saline*)
or
"plastic infinite waterfall
the matched "Danish* living room "set" (*Saline*)
or Nada's: "the
lamb chop in the dryer,
the snow shovel
in the rumpus room, thinking
if i had a round horse" (*GORGEOUS*a vestibule* from *V. IMP.*)
Well, anyway, the basement's where the imagination is sometimes forced to hide, especially in Brooklyn, my teen years Brooklyn of Bay Ridge,at my parent's house on BR Parkway, with its cement floor cnvered in outdated technology and turn-of-the-century French magazines.
Sure, I pledge allegiance to the books and the language of America as much as the next gal, but after all, the way hour follows hour and day follows day is not that much like a vocabulary exercise; it's more about trying not to get depressed, even trying to renew not just your library card. but this ceaselessly ironic daily life.
OK, not easy but not pathetic either, if there's hope in the rarely automatic quotidian promises of life:
at least that's what I'm getting from Amy King today.
"On top of my name, devotions, no woman
chain whips and lovers: coffee is how
I get other/ countries inside my body." (*ON THE OUNCE THAT SELLS US OUT*)
and:
"Marilyn as metaphor is
applepie modeled on
the grandmothers of invention" (*THE TEMPERATURE'S MOVIE LIFE*)
Am I not THAT old afterall?
Thanks, Amy.
Thursday, March 22
"The Theory of the Active Reader"
There are a few books on my desk that I keep coming back to obsessively, that I can't keep my hands off of. Some are brand new, like *Ripple Effect* by Elaine Equi, (many of these poems were prevously published in her books from Coffee House) There are some timeless hits like *Lesbian Corn* "In summer/I strip away/your pale kimono" and some new lines sure to become classics like: "Autumn is a solitude/Winter is a fortitude/Spring is an altitude/ Summer is an attitude." This is a "New and Selected", but like some other new and selecteds, namely, Ann Lauterbach's stunning *If In Time* (Penguin) and Kathleen Fraser's beautiful *il cuore: the heart*, when you are affectionately familiar with the originals, it can be a joy to see how the poet regathers and reconnects the poems. For all these reasons and more I am eagerly looking forward to exploring what David Shapiro has done with this form (his selected is just out from Overlook), and getting absorbed in Charles North's recent new selected, his previous one long a favorite of mine, and I am particularly anticipating discovering how Tom Beckett shapes his current poetic and aesthetic viewpoint through such an arrangement of his earlier and recent work..
As soon as I start reading in Ammiel Alcalay's new (2007) book for Factory School's *Heretical Texts * series, *Scrapmetal" I immediately feel like again paging through its 2002 predecessor *from the warring factions* from Beyond Baroque. Similarly, Simon Pettet's 2005 book *More Winnowed Fragments", returns me to his 1995 Selected Poems from Talisman House.
My eyes delight in paging through the visual pleasures of Nico Vassilakis' new book from Otoliths *Diptychs*, and I am anticipating delving into recently publishedOtoliths books by bloggers Harry K. Stammer, Mark Young, Sandra Simonds,Vernon Frazer, Jordan Stempleman, and Jean Vengua.
Ron Silliman's *Woundwood*, a fine chapbook from Cuneiform, will no doubt disappear off the shelves of bookstores quickly; and I noted recently at the St Mark's Bookstore that his brilliant *Age of Huts* that includes the classic Chinese Notebook has been spiffed up and reissued.
This is the thing about poetry. When it's good, it doesn't get old, so as I mentioned yesterday, I was pleased to see Kasey Mohammad review a book from Lytle Shaw, Lobe, from a few years ago. Charles Alexander's *Certain Slants*("thank you for the book/to write in to lie down in') (Junction, 2007) sent me hunting through my shelves for his unforgettable *Arc of Light/Living Matter* (1992, Segue) ("calling them bloomies calling, jams to brace her bread warmed and butter recedes"), as well as his great 2004 Singing Horse Press book, *near or random acts* ("cash flies her away form/prose's comfortable kingdom"). No,my books are not in alphabetical order as Mitch Highfill noticed on a recent visit here with Kimberly Lyons. Mitch spoke eloquently about Alan Davies' poetry and why should I be surprised when Mr. Davies' new chapbook from Katalanche, *Book 5* ("slip into/ love like/genital/marginalia" should quickly lead me to search my shelf and reread in its entirety his famous This Book classic *Name*(1986):"Before we were happy/we were human." You want to listen to these edgy, delicate echoes resound in your mind over and over.
Taylor Brady wrote in his 2005 Factory School *yesterday's news"This is my theory /of the active reader, and it is dense." Indeed it is, and thus I oscillate between that and his 2006 book *Occupational Treatment* from Atelos. Well, it's now past 2 a.m. and I should get some sleep- after all, But now my fingers have come across my copy of *microclimates*(Krupskaya, 2002)-well I know I need to delve into that one further, which will no doubt take me back to the other two. I do have to work tomorrow. But how could a week be complete without reading awhile in Drew Gardner's 2005 Roof Book *Petroleum Hat* "Bad boys are full, tamed, safe/and charged with sexuality." Uh-huh! And Katie Degentesh's 2006 Combo Book *Anger Scale*"Since I just got a haircut today/everything is turning jiggy around me." Hard to get through a week or two without looking for an attitude refresher in their two books.And I want to stay up all night and write about Rodney Koeneke's *Musee Mechanique*, a 2006 book from Blaze/Vox: ("the delicious limbs of summer"),Gary Sullivan's *Elsewhere* #2 (2006) with text by Nada Gordon; "is your throat dry with the deviousness of following?"; Norman Fischer's powerful *I Was Blown Back* (Singing Horse 2005), Johanna Drucker's electrically syncopated typographical wonder *From Now* (Cuneiform, 2005), Heriberto Yepez's psychologically riveting soon to be a cult classic *Wars. Threesomes. Drafts.& Mothers (Heretical Texts, 2007), Catherine Daly's politically awakening yet subtly lyrical *Chanteuse/Cantatrice*, also from the Heretical Texts 2007 series (her book includes "collaborative" quotes from every Heretical Texts writer!). I want to be an insomniac blogger again, as I was in 2003 and keep reading and writing about Tim Peterson's award winning *Since I Moved In * (it won the first Gill Ott award) ("Why you writng a poem called The Age of Advertising/anyway?"). Ray DiPalma's *Mules At The Wake* ("what trace lingers in this edit"), Mode A's Grand Piano 1 & 2 "Door, garden, shadow, skirt. Are these ideal forms I envision in my mind's eye?" (Carla Harryman). And, as part of my recent desire to delve into German and Austrian history based on the moving, politically potent recent Weimar Show at the Met, I am enjoying Marjorie Perloff's engaging *The Vienna Paradox* (New Directions, 2004) ("This was, in any case, the book that I was reading in Innsbruck while our suitcases were being searched and our money taken away" as well as Wolf Lepenies' fascinating and provocative *The Seductiion of Culture in German History* ("But the illusionary overrating of culture thus played a particularly dangerous role in German history." And, as part of my ongoing feminist self-analysis, I have been enjoined by Charles Bernstein in his inscription to my copy to "be a" *Girly Man*("day retreats into quicksand/on the good nights.)" And, smiling impishly from behind a fan, who do we see holding a new Roof Book with an arresting cover designed by Gary Sullivan but Nada Gordon who will be celebrating her new book *Folly*, approprately enough on April Fool's day at James Sherry's loft on Sunday afternoon, April 1st. And she has hinted that she hopes all will come, say. imaginatively attired.
to be continued (including mentions and or reviews-trumpets and drums please- of the names Bob Perelman, Ron Silliman, and Rae Armantrout in recent editions of the New York Times Book Review and Art Forum. Ta-Da! A lot to celebrate, but now it's it's getting way late!)
There are a few books on my desk that I keep coming back to obsessively, that I can't keep my hands off of. Some are brand new, like *Ripple Effect* by Elaine Equi, (many of these poems were prevously published in her books from Coffee House) There are some timeless hits like *Lesbian Corn* "In summer/I strip away/your pale kimono" and some new lines sure to become classics like: "Autumn is a solitude/Winter is a fortitude/Spring is an altitude/ Summer is an attitude." This is a "New and Selected", but like some other new and selecteds, namely, Ann Lauterbach's stunning *If In Time* (Penguin) and Kathleen Fraser's beautiful *il cuore: the heart*, when you are affectionately familiar with the originals, it can be a joy to see how the poet regathers and reconnects the poems. For all these reasons and more I am eagerly looking forward to exploring what David Shapiro has done with this form (his selected is just out from Overlook), and getting absorbed in Charles North's recent new selected, his previous one long a favorite of mine, and I am particularly anticipating discovering how Tom Beckett shapes his current poetic and aesthetic viewpoint through such an arrangement of his earlier and recent work..
As soon as I start reading in Ammiel Alcalay's new (2007) book for Factory School's *Heretical Texts * series, *Scrapmetal" I immediately feel like again paging through its 2002 predecessor *from the warring factions* from Beyond Baroque. Similarly, Simon Pettet's 2005 book *More Winnowed Fragments", returns me to his 1995 Selected Poems from Talisman House.
My eyes delight in paging through the visual pleasures of Nico Vassilakis' new book from Otoliths *Diptychs*, and I am anticipating delving into recently publishedOtoliths books by bloggers Harry K. Stammer, Mark Young, Sandra Simonds,Vernon Frazer, Jordan Stempleman, and Jean Vengua.
Ron Silliman's *Woundwood*, a fine chapbook from Cuneiform, will no doubt disappear off the shelves of bookstores quickly; and I noted recently at the St Mark's Bookstore that his brilliant *Age of Huts* that includes the classic Chinese Notebook has been spiffed up and reissued.
This is the thing about poetry. When it's good, it doesn't get old, so as I mentioned yesterday, I was pleased to see Kasey Mohammad review a book from Lytle Shaw, Lobe, from a few years ago. Charles Alexander's *Certain Slants*("thank you for the book/to write in to lie down in') (Junction, 2007) sent me hunting through my shelves for his unforgettable *Arc of Light/Living Matter* (1992, Segue) ("calling them bloomies calling, jams to brace her bread warmed and butter recedes"), as well as his great 2004 Singing Horse Press book, *near or random acts* ("cash flies her away form/prose's comfortable kingdom"). No,my books are not in alphabetical order as Mitch Highfill noticed on a recent visit here with Kimberly Lyons. Mitch spoke eloquently about Alan Davies' poetry and why should I be surprised when Mr. Davies' new chapbook from Katalanche, *Book 5* ("slip into/ love like/genital/marginalia" should quickly lead me to search my shelf and reread in its entirety his famous This Book classic *Name*(1986):"Before we were happy/we were human." You want to listen to these edgy, delicate echoes resound in your mind over and over.
Taylor Brady wrote in his 2005 Factory School *yesterday's news"This is my theory /of the active reader, and it is dense." Indeed it is, and thus I oscillate between that and his 2006 book *Occupational Treatment* from Atelos. Well, it's now past 2 a.m. and I should get some sleep- after all, But now my fingers have come across my copy of *microclimates*(Krupskaya, 2002)-well I know I need to delve into that one further, which will no doubt take me back to the other two. I do have to work tomorrow. But how could a week be complete without reading awhile in Drew Gardner's 2005 Roof Book *Petroleum Hat* "Bad boys are full, tamed, safe/and charged with sexuality." Uh-huh! And Katie Degentesh's 2006 Combo Book *Anger Scale*"Since I just got a haircut today/everything is turning jiggy around me." Hard to get through a week or two without looking for an attitude refresher in their two books.And I want to stay up all night and write about Rodney Koeneke's *Musee Mechanique*, a 2006 book from Blaze/Vox: ("the delicious limbs of summer"),Gary Sullivan's *Elsewhere* #2 (2006) with text by Nada Gordon; "is your throat dry with the deviousness of following?"; Norman Fischer's powerful *I Was Blown Back* (Singing Horse 2005), Johanna Drucker's electrically syncopated typographical wonder *From Now* (Cuneiform, 2005), Heriberto Yepez's psychologically riveting soon to be a cult classic *Wars. Threesomes. Drafts.& Mothers (Heretical Texts, 2007), Catherine Daly's politically awakening yet subtly lyrical *Chanteuse/Cantatrice*, also from the Heretical Texts 2007 series (her book includes "collaborative" quotes from every Heretical Texts writer!). I want to be an insomniac blogger again, as I was in 2003 and keep reading and writing about Tim Peterson's award winning *Since I Moved In * (it won the first Gill Ott award) ("Why you writng a poem called The Age of Advertising/anyway?"). Ray DiPalma's *Mules At The Wake* ("what trace lingers in this edit"), Mode A's Grand Piano 1 & 2 "Door, garden, shadow, skirt. Are these ideal forms I envision in my mind's eye?" (Carla Harryman). And, as part of my recent desire to delve into German and Austrian history based on the moving, politically potent recent Weimar Show at the Met, I am enjoying Marjorie Perloff's engaging *The Vienna Paradox* (New Directions, 2004) ("This was, in any case, the book that I was reading in Innsbruck while our suitcases were being searched and our money taken away" as well as Wolf Lepenies' fascinating and provocative *The Seductiion of Culture in German History* ("But the illusionary overrating of culture thus played a particularly dangerous role in German history." And, as part of my ongoing feminist self-analysis, I have been enjoined by Charles Bernstein in his inscription to my copy to "be a" *Girly Man*("day retreats into quicksand/on the good nights.)" And, smiling impishly from behind a fan, who do we see holding a new Roof Book with an arresting cover designed by Gary Sullivan but Nada Gordon who will be celebrating her new book *Folly*, approprately enough on April Fool's day at James Sherry's loft on Sunday afternoon, April 1st. And she has hinted that she hopes all will come, say. imaginatively attired.
to be continued (including mentions and or reviews-trumpets and drums please- of the names Bob Perelman, Ron Silliman, and Rae Armantrout in recent editions of the New York Times Book Review and Art Forum. Ta-Da! A lot to celebrate, but now it's it's getting way late!)
Tuesday, March 20
Contradicta
When others do not want what you have to give, should this stop you from getting what you want to give?
*********************
When life is confusing for those who think for themselves, the confused are running the show.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
*The Grand Piano*: A Socratic Dialogue by
Nada Gordon (Ululations)
t<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
There's Still Hope Dep't: A Review of a Poetry Book 3 Years Old!
Kasey Silem Mohammad
Limetree reviews *The Lobe* by Lytle Shaw
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Jackson Mac Low Remembered
Someone requested anecdotes about Jackson on the Buffalo poetics list recently
and I've been posting some there. One of them was the second entry in my new
*fait accompli* book and blogger Amy King was inspired to write a post about my discussion
in that entry about "ambivalence. " Here:
Amy King's blog
When others do not want what you have to give, should this stop you from getting what you want to give?
*********************
When life is confusing for those who think for themselves, the confused are running the show.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
*The Grand Piano*: A Socratic Dialogue by
Nada Gordon (Ululations)
t<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
There's Still Hope Dep't: A Review of a Poetry Book 3 Years Old!
Kasey Silem Mohammad
Limetree reviews *The Lobe* by Lytle Shaw
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Jackson Mac Low Remembered
Someone requested anecdotes about Jackson on the Buffalo poetics list recently
and I've been posting some there. One of them was the second entry in my new
*fait accompli* book and blogger Amy King was inspired to write a post about my discussion
in that entry about "ambivalence. " Here:
Amy King's blog
Out of The Shadows
Yesterday Wood s Lot posted a link to a March 2004 *fait accompli* posting about the psychoanalyst Christopher Bollas' fascinating book *The Shadow of The Object: Psychoanalysis of the Unthought Known" as follows: Bollas. Although *fait accompli* has always focused on "time travel" as a central theme, no blog has shown a more consistent perseverence in finding the roots of the present in the past than *wood s lot*. In honor of that effort on the part of Mark Woods, we are posting here another few brief quotations from Bollas' invaluable book.
The aspect of Bollas' book we focused on back then was Bollas' concept of the normatic. Bollas pursues the theme further:
"The fundamental identifying feature of this individual is a disinclination to entertain the subjective element in life, whether it exists inside himself ot in the other. The introspective capacity has rarely been used. Such a person appears genuinely naive if asked to comment on issues that require either looking into oneself or the other in any depth. Instead, if the evolution towards becoming a normotic personality is successful, he lives contentedly among material objects and phenomena.
By the subjective element I mean the internal play of affects and ideas that generates and authorizes our private imaginations, creatively informs our work and gives continuing resource to interpersonal relations. The subjective ability amounts to a particular kind of internal space (Stewart, 1985) that facilitates the reception of unconscious affects, memories and perceptions.
The normotic person seems unable to experience evolving subjective states within himself. Without moods he may appear unusually steady or sound. If he is forced by circumstances into a complex situation in which the subjective element is called into play (such as being part of a family quarrel, or discussing a film, or hearing of tragic events) he betrays the absence of a subjective world. He may speak of a phenomenon as an object in its own right, laden with known laws, and thus undertandable. A quarrel might lead him to say 'you people are just being unreasonable', or *Hamlet* might inspire him to say 'an unhappy young fellah', or more often than not, he lapses into repectful silence." (p. 137)
"If psychotic illness is characterized by a break in reality orientation and a loss of contact with the real world, then normotic illness is typified by a radical break with subjectivity and by a profound absence of the subjective element in everyday life. As psychotic illness is marked by a turning inward into the world of fantasy and hallucination, normotic illness is distinctive as a turning outward into concrete objects and towards conventional behavior. The normotic flees from dream life, subjective states of mind, imaginative living and aggressive play with the other. Discharges of mental life is favoured over articulated elaborations that require symbolic processes and real communication. We could say that if the psychotic has
gone off at the deep end", the normotic has "gone off at the shallow end."
A normotic family may be successful for some time, depending on material comfort and the availability of personal wealth. As they need a supply of material objects to enrich their personal happiness, they are far more dependent than other sorts of people on the flux of economic life. For example, if one of the parents becomes unemployed, this amounts to more than a redundancy: it threatens the breakdown of a mentality. It does not lead to reflection or to affective states that deepen the family members' understanding of themselves and of their life. A father may become absent, either literally, by going off and staying away from home, or he may sit before the TV for long periods of time. We would say that there is a depression there, but from inside the family; it is the experience of 'leave your father alone' whose mental equivalent is 'leave that part of your mind concerned with your father alone'....
What is the nature of normotic communication? I do not think that it follows the laws of Bion's theory of beta functioning- specifically, objects are not manipulated via projective identification. Almost the opposite happens. It is as if language 'transformers' are used that launder a communication of all meaning, thus enabling the person to vaporize conflict and appear perfectly normal. This takes place by incorporating phrases that are in themselves meaningful, but that are used so repetitively that they eventually lose their originating subjectivity. I am referring to the use of familiar phrases by a person, indeed to the constriction of vocabulary, a foreclosure of language that would be observeable only over time in the knowing of any one individual. So, for example, a person who has a normotic personality disorder would be found to use a vocabulary of phrases that laundered the self of all meaning: phrases such as 'that's tragic' or 'uh huh' or 'yeah' or 'wow' that nullify meaning whilst appearing to recognize significance. Or a person might have more complex phrases such as "gosh, that's really amazing' or 'it's extraordinary what the world is coming to' which deflect meaning away from subjective exchange....
As has been suggested, the outcome of such a situation is a person who apears really quite extroverted and able. He seems to be without conflict, even in a troubled world. He manages distress through the use of 'language transformers' that alter significance into insignificance by virtue of the use of a vocabulary of phrases that function as evacuators of meaning."
(quoted from pages 146-155) *The Shadow of The Object* by Christopher Bollas, New York, Columbia Universtiy Press, 1987
Used copies from AbeBooks
Yesterday Wood s Lot posted a link to a March 2004 *fait accompli* posting about the psychoanalyst Christopher Bollas' fascinating book *The Shadow of The Object: Psychoanalysis of the Unthought Known" as follows: Bollas. Although *fait accompli* has always focused on "time travel" as a central theme, no blog has shown a more consistent perseverence in finding the roots of the present in the past than *wood s lot*. In honor of that effort on the part of Mark Woods, we are posting here another few brief quotations from Bollas' invaluable book.
The aspect of Bollas' book we focused on back then was Bollas' concept of the normatic. Bollas pursues the theme further:
"The fundamental identifying feature of this individual is a disinclination to entertain the subjective element in life, whether it exists inside himself ot in the other. The introspective capacity has rarely been used. Such a person appears genuinely naive if asked to comment on issues that require either looking into oneself or the other in any depth. Instead, if the evolution towards becoming a normotic personality is successful, he lives contentedly among material objects and phenomena.
By the subjective element I mean the internal play of affects and ideas that generates and authorizes our private imaginations, creatively informs our work and gives continuing resource to interpersonal relations. The subjective ability amounts to a particular kind of internal space (Stewart, 1985) that facilitates the reception of unconscious affects, memories and perceptions.
The normotic person seems unable to experience evolving subjective states within himself. Without moods he may appear unusually steady or sound. If he is forced by circumstances into a complex situation in which the subjective element is called into play (such as being part of a family quarrel, or discussing a film, or hearing of tragic events) he betrays the absence of a subjective world. He may speak of a phenomenon as an object in its own right, laden with known laws, and thus undertandable. A quarrel might lead him to say 'you people are just being unreasonable', or *Hamlet* might inspire him to say 'an unhappy young fellah', or more often than not, he lapses into repectful silence." (p. 137)
"If psychotic illness is characterized by a break in reality orientation and a loss of contact with the real world, then normotic illness is typified by a radical break with subjectivity and by a profound absence of the subjective element in everyday life. As psychotic illness is marked by a turning inward into the world of fantasy and hallucination, normotic illness is distinctive as a turning outward into concrete objects and towards conventional behavior. The normotic flees from dream life, subjective states of mind, imaginative living and aggressive play with the other. Discharges of mental life is favoured over articulated elaborations that require symbolic processes and real communication. We could say that if the psychotic has
gone off at the deep end", the normotic has "gone off at the shallow end."
A normotic family may be successful for some time, depending on material comfort and the availability of personal wealth. As they need a supply of material objects to enrich their personal happiness, they are far more dependent than other sorts of people on the flux of economic life. For example, if one of the parents becomes unemployed, this amounts to more than a redundancy: it threatens the breakdown of a mentality. It does not lead to reflection or to affective states that deepen the family members' understanding of themselves and of their life. A father may become absent, either literally, by going off and staying away from home, or he may sit before the TV for long periods of time. We would say that there is a depression there, but from inside the family; it is the experience of 'leave your father alone' whose mental equivalent is 'leave that part of your mind concerned with your father alone'....
What is the nature of normotic communication? I do not think that it follows the laws of Bion's theory of beta functioning- specifically, objects are not manipulated via projective identification. Almost the opposite happens. It is as if language 'transformers' are used that launder a communication of all meaning, thus enabling the person to vaporize conflict and appear perfectly normal. This takes place by incorporating phrases that are in themselves meaningful, but that are used so repetitively that they eventually lose their originating subjectivity. I am referring to the use of familiar phrases by a person, indeed to the constriction of vocabulary, a foreclosure of language that would be observeable only over time in the knowing of any one individual. So, for example, a person who has a normotic personality disorder would be found to use a vocabulary of phrases that laundered the self of all meaning: phrases such as 'that's tragic' or 'uh huh' or 'yeah' or 'wow' that nullify meaning whilst appearing to recognize significance. Or a person might have more complex phrases such as "gosh, that's really amazing' or 'it's extraordinary what the world is coming to' which deflect meaning away from subjective exchange....
As has been suggested, the outcome of such a situation is a person who apears really quite extroverted and able. He seems to be without conflict, even in a troubled world. He manages distress through the use of 'language transformers' that alter significance into insignificance by virtue of the use of a vocabulary of phrases that function as evacuators of meaning."
(quoted from pages 146-155) *The Shadow of The Object* by Christopher Bollas, New York, Columbia Universtiy Press, 1987
Used copies from AbeBooks
Monday, March 19
Sunday, March 18
Tom Beckett interviews Australian poet Jill Jones
on e-x-c-h-a-n-g-e-v-a-l-u-e-s
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
BOOK PARTY
Ripple Effect:
New & Selected Poems
by Elaine Equi
Friday, March 30th
6:30 PM
CUE Art Foundation
511 W. 25th St.
Theremin music by
Andy Karlock
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
2 reviews, one brand new (Today), one old (2000) on the poetry of Rae Armantrout
by Stephen Burt
NY Times
Boston Review
Saturday, March 17
Friday, March 16
You Can't Hurry Love
"You can�t hurry love
No, you just have to wait
She said love don�t come easy
It�s a game of give and take"
Tom Beckett (Soluble Census) asks a good question.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Gary Sullivan Tunes The Grand Piano, Part 1
Elsewhere
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
Timothy Yu readings in New York and Chicago
April 7, 2007
730 PM @ Lolita Bar
no cover
266 Broome St., NYC
(corner of Broome & Allen)
Emmy Catedral | Kevin Coval | Thom Donovan |
Wanda Phipps | Sukhdev Sandhu | Timothy Yu |
Sunday, April 8, 5 pm
Verlaine
110 Rivington St., NYC
(Ludlow & Essex Sts.)
212-614-2494
F train to Delancey or V train to 2nd Ave
$5 donation
Sunday, April 22, 7 pm
Myopic Books
1564 N. Milwaukee Ave., Chicago
http://www.myopicbookstore.com/poetry.html
"You can�t hurry love
No, you just have to wait
She said love don�t come easy
It�s a game of give and take"
Tom Beckett (Soluble Census) asks a good question.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Gary Sullivan Tunes The Grand Piano, Part 1
Elsewhere
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
Timothy Yu readings in New York and Chicago
April 7, 2007
730 PM @ Lolita Bar
no cover
266 Broome St., NYC
(corner of Broome & Allen)
Emmy Catedral | Kevin Coval | Thom Donovan |
Wanda Phipps | Sukhdev Sandhu | Timothy Yu |
Sunday, April 8, 5 pm
Verlaine
110 Rivington St., NYC
(Ludlow & Essex Sts.)
212-614-2494
F train to Delancey or V train to 2nd Ave
$5 donation
Sunday, April 22, 7 pm
Myopic Books
1564 N. Milwaukee Ave., Chicago
http://www.myopicbookstore.com/poetry.html
Thursday, March 15
Contadicta
Our glimpse of life is from a train going fast: where we can barely distinguish the present from the past.
********************
Love is watered by truth at its roots but its arms reach up towards light and kndness.
**************************************
MoMA presents M o d e r n P o e t s
Revitalizing Frank O’Hara’s legacy and MoMA’s historical commitment
to poetry, this new series invites poets to bring the literary tradition to
the Museum’s collection. Three times a year, poets read historical works
and their own work that reflects on modern and contemporary art.
Writing in Time: Poets and Technology
Wednesday, March 28, 6:00 p.m.
The Celeste Bartos Theater
4 West 54 Street, between Fifth and Sixth avenues
Greta Byrum Robert Fitterman
Kenneth Goldsmith Caroline Bergvall
The exhibition Out of Time: A Contemporary View considers notions
of temporality and reconstructions of time through memory, fantasy,
dreams, and history in a variety of media. The increasing prevalence
of technology, whether as an artist’s medium or as visual stimulation
in mass culture, changes the way we experience, record, and perceive
time. On the occasion of this exhibition, MoMA asked poets to explore
how technology informs the language and rhythms of poetry. Greta
Byrum, poet and sound artist; Robert Fitterman, poet; Kenneth
Goldsmith, poet, Professor, Creative Writing Program, The University
of Pennsylvania, and founding editor of ubuweb.com; and Caroline
Bergvall, poet, and Co-Chair, Writing MFA, Milton Avery School
for the Arts, Bard College, read works of their own and of others.
This program is a collaboration between The Museum of Modern Art
and ubuweb.com.
Tickets ($5; members, students, seniors, and staff of other museums
$3) can be purchased at the lobby information desk, the Film desk,
the Cullman Building lobby, or online at www.ticketweb.com.
The Museum of Modern Art
Our glimpse of life is from a train going fast: where we can barely distinguish the present from the past.
********************
Love is watered by truth at its roots but its arms reach up towards light and kndness.
**************************************
MoMA presents M o d e r n P o e t s
Revitalizing Frank O’Hara’s legacy and MoMA’s historical commitment
to poetry, this new series invites poets to bring the literary tradition to
the Museum’s collection. Three times a year, poets read historical works
and their own work that reflects on modern and contemporary art.
Writing in Time: Poets and Technology
Wednesday, March 28, 6:00 p.m.
The Celeste Bartos Theater
4 West 54 Street, between Fifth and Sixth avenues
Greta Byrum Robert Fitterman
Kenneth Goldsmith Caroline Bergvall
The exhibition Out of Time: A Contemporary View considers notions
of temporality and reconstructions of time through memory, fantasy,
dreams, and history in a variety of media. The increasing prevalence
of technology, whether as an artist’s medium or as visual stimulation
in mass culture, changes the way we experience, record, and perceive
time. On the occasion of this exhibition, MoMA asked poets to explore
how technology informs the language and rhythms of poetry. Greta
Byrum, poet and sound artist; Robert Fitterman, poet; Kenneth
Goldsmith, poet, Professor, Creative Writing Program, The University
of Pennsylvania, and founding editor of ubuweb.com; and Caroline
Bergvall, poet, and Co-Chair, Writing MFA, Milton Avery School
for the Arts, Bard College, read works of their own and of others.
This program is a collaboration between The Museum of Modern Art
and ubuweb.com.
Tickets ($5; members, students, seniors, and staff of other museums
$3) can be purchased at the lobby information desk, the Film desk,
the Cullman Building lobby, or online at www.ticketweb.com.
The Museum of Modern Art
Tuesday, March 13
Monday, March 12
Is Your Jacket Half Empty of Half Full?
-check out Elaine Equi's *Greeting Card Poems* in the advance copy of #32
plus Douglas Messerli, Gilbert Adair, Andrea Brady, Michael Gottlieb, James Sherry, Michael Kelleher
and many, many others now and still to come in April
Jacket 32
****************
Tom Beckett on Alan Davies' new chapbook *Book 5* Soluble Census
-check out Elaine Equi's *Greeting Card Poems* in the advance copy of #32
plus Douglas Messerli, Gilbert Adair, Andrea Brady, Michael Gottlieb, James Sherry, Michael Kelleher
and many, many others now and still to come in April
Jacket 32
****************
Tom Beckett on Alan Davies' new chapbook *Book 5* Soluble Census
Saturday, March 10
This Just In! 4 books on SPD's February Bestseller List From Factory School's Heretical Texts
Check out #'s 7, 9, 14, and 29
SPD Poetry Bestsellers
February 2007:
1. Eunoia Christian Bok (Coach House Press)
2. Wisteria: Twilight Poems From the Swamp Country Kwame Dawes (Black Goat)
3. Necessary Stranger Graham Foust (Flood Editions)
4. Chromatic H.L. Hix (Etruscan Press)
5. Glean Joshua Kryah (Nightboat Books)
6. Loveliest Grotesque Sandra Lim (Kore Press)
7. Scrapmetal Ammiel Alcalay (Factory School)
8. Howl & Other Poems Allen Ginsberg (City Lights)
9. Wars. Threesomes. Drafts. & Mothers Heriberto Yepez (Factory School)
10. Friday and the Year that Followed Juan J. Morales (Fairweather Books/Bedbug Press)
11. The Book of Questions Pablo Neruda (Copper Canyon Press)
12. What if Your Mother Judith Arcana (Chicory Blue Press)
13. Apostrophe Elizabeth Robinson (Apogee Press)
14. Fait Accompli Nick Piombino (Factory School)
15. Untangled Keren Taylor, Ed. (WriteGirl)
16. Blackboards Tomaz Salamun (Saturnalia Books)
17. Cadenza Charles North (Hanging Loose Press)
18. Fugue State Bill Berkson (Zoland)
19. Prime Time Apparitions R. Zamora Linmark (Hanging Loose Press)
20. Vacationland Ander Monson (Tupelo)
21. Woundwood Ron Silliman (Cuneiform Press)
22. Concordance Mei-mei Berssenbrugge/Kiki Smith, art (Kelsey Street Press)
23. Retreats & Recognitions Grace Bauer (Lost Horse Press)
24. Sadder than Water: Selected Poems Samih al-Qasim
(IBIS Editions)
25. Seismosis John Keene & Christopher Stackhouse (1913 Press)
26. Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English Tosa Motokiyu (Combo Books)
27. Analects on a Chinese Screen Glenn Mott (Chax Press)
28. Bone Pagoda Susan Tichy (Ahsahta Press)
29. Chanteuse/Cantarice Catherine Daly (Factory School)
30. Deathstar/Ricochet Judith Goldman (O Books)
*****************************************************
Boog City 39
Available Sunday P.M.
featuring:
***Music section, edited by Jon Berger***
*** Printed Matter section, edited by Mark Lamoureux***
*** Film section, guest edited by Jon Berger***
*** Politics section, edited by Christina Strong***
***Art editor Brenda Iijima brings us work from Belford New Jersey's Kate
Greenstreet***
*** Poetry section, edited by Laura Elrick and Rodrigo Toscano***
*And photos from David S. Rubio and Christina Strong.*
-----
Please patronize our advertisers:
Bowery Poetry Club * http://www.bowerypoetry.com
::fait accompli:: * http://www.nickpiombino.blogspot.com/
The Million Poems Show * http://www.jordandavis.com/Talkshow.html
-----
Advertising or donation inquiries can be directed to
editor@boogcity.com or by calling 212-842-BOOG (2664)
-----
2,250 copies of Boog City are distributed among, and available for free at,
the following locations:
MANHATTAN
*THE EAST VILLAGE*
Acme Underground
Alt.coffee
Angelika Film Center and Café
Anthology Film Archives
Bluestockings
Bowery Poetry Club
Café Pick Me Up
CB's 313 Gallery
CBGB's
Lakeside Lounge
Life Café
Mission Café
Nuyorican Poets Café
Pianos
The Pink Pony
St. Mark's Books
St. Mark's Church
Shakespeare & Co.
Sidewalk Café
Sunshine Theater
Tonic
Trash and Vaudeville
*OTHER PARTS OF MANHATTAN*
Hotel Chelsea
Poets House
BROOKLYN
*WILLIAMSBURG*
Bliss Café
Earwax
Galapagos
Northsix
Sideshow Gallery
Soundfix/Fix Cafe
Supercore Café
*GREENPOINT*
(available later next week)
Greenpoint Coffee House
Lulu's
Photoplay
Thai Cafe
The Pencil Factory
--
David A. Kirschenbaum, editor and publisher
Boog City
330 W.28th St., Suite 6H
NY, NY 10001-4754
For event and publication information:
http://boogcityevents.blogspot.com/
T: (212) 842-BOOG (2664)
F: (212) 842-2429
Check out #'s 7, 9, 14, and 29
SPD Poetry Bestsellers
February 2007:
1. Eunoia Christian Bok (Coach House Press)
2. Wisteria: Twilight Poems From the Swamp Country Kwame Dawes (Black Goat)
3. Necessary Stranger Graham Foust (Flood Editions)
4. Chromatic H.L. Hix (Etruscan Press)
5. Glean Joshua Kryah (Nightboat Books)
6. Loveliest Grotesque Sandra Lim (Kore Press)
7. Scrapmetal Ammiel Alcalay (Factory School)
8. Howl & Other Poems Allen Ginsberg (City Lights)
9. Wars. Threesomes. Drafts. & Mothers Heriberto Yepez (Factory School)
10. Friday and the Year that Followed Juan J. Morales (Fairweather Books/Bedbug Press)
11. The Book of Questions Pablo Neruda (Copper Canyon Press)
12. What if Your Mother Judith Arcana (Chicory Blue Press)
13. Apostrophe Elizabeth Robinson (Apogee Press)
14. Fait Accompli Nick Piombino (Factory School)
15. Untangled Keren Taylor, Ed. (WriteGirl)
16. Blackboards Tomaz Salamun (Saturnalia Books)
17. Cadenza Charles North (Hanging Loose Press)
18. Fugue State Bill Berkson (Zoland)
19. Prime Time Apparitions R. Zamora Linmark (Hanging Loose Press)
20. Vacationland Ander Monson (Tupelo)
21. Woundwood Ron Silliman (Cuneiform Press)
22. Concordance Mei-mei Berssenbrugge/Kiki Smith, art (Kelsey Street Press)
23. Retreats & Recognitions Grace Bauer (Lost Horse Press)
24. Sadder than Water: Selected Poems Samih al-Qasim
(IBIS Editions)
25. Seismosis John Keene & Christopher Stackhouse (1913 Press)
26. Also, With My Throat, I Shall Swallow Ten Thousand Swords: Araki Yasusada's Letters in English Tosa Motokiyu (Combo Books)
27. Analects on a Chinese Screen Glenn Mott (Chax Press)
28. Bone Pagoda Susan Tichy (Ahsahta Press)
29. Chanteuse/Cantarice Catherine Daly (Factory School)
30. Deathstar/Ricochet Judith Goldman (O Books)
*****************************************************
Boog City 39
Available Sunday P.M.
featuring:
***Music section, edited by Jon Berger***
*** Printed Matter section, edited by Mark Lamoureux***
*** Film section, guest edited by Jon Berger***
*** Politics section, edited by Christina Strong***
***Art editor Brenda Iijima brings us work from Belford New Jersey's Kate
Greenstreet***
*** Poetry section, edited by Laura Elrick and Rodrigo Toscano***
*And photos from David S. Rubio and Christina Strong.*
-----
Please patronize our advertisers:
Bowery Poetry Club * http://www.bowerypoetry.com
::fait accompli:: * http://www.nickpiombino.blogspot.com/
The Million Poems Show * http://www.jordandavis.com/Talkshow.html
-----
Advertising or donation inquiries can be directed to
editor@boogcity.com or by calling 212-842-BOOG (2664)
-----
2,250 copies of Boog City are distributed among, and available for free at,
the following locations:
MANHATTAN
*THE EAST VILLAGE*
Acme Underground
Alt.coffee
Angelika Film Center and Café
Anthology Film Archives
Bluestockings
Bowery Poetry Club
Café Pick Me Up
CB's 313 Gallery
CBGB's
Lakeside Lounge
Life Café
Mission Café
Nuyorican Poets Café
Pianos
The Pink Pony
St. Mark's Books
St. Mark's Church
Shakespeare & Co.
Sidewalk Café
Sunshine Theater
Tonic
Trash and Vaudeville
*OTHER PARTS OF MANHATTAN*
Hotel Chelsea
Poets House
BROOKLYN
*WILLIAMSBURG*
Bliss Café
Earwax
Galapagos
Northsix
Sideshow Gallery
Soundfix/Fix Cafe
Supercore Café
*GREENPOINT*
(available later next week)
Greenpoint Coffee House
Lulu's
Photoplay
Thai Cafe
The Pencil Factory
--
David A. Kirschenbaum, editor and publisher
Boog City
330 W.28th St., Suite 6H
NY, NY 10001-4754
For event and publication information:
http://boogcityevents.blogspot.com/
T: (212) 842-BOOG (2664)
F: (212) 842-2429
Tuesday, March 6
from "The Apprentice" by Lewis Libby
Thomas Dunne Books, 2001
"In his flight he looked at his telltale trail through the snow with alarm. He struggled to form a plan.
Surely if someone has followed me, he thought, surely they'll stop to search the shrine. He knew that would take some time. He could count on some delay.
But in the very next instant he realized that the man with the glasses had claimed to see more than one man in the grove. If they divided, some of them might even then be gaining on him.
The youth saw now that he had been on a fool's errand, and this tired him further. He knew he had stayed too long in the shrine. Thinking back, he realized that the hole he dug searching for the packet would tell a plain tale. Having once uncovered the box, he could not now so readily rid himself of it....
He resolved that if he were caught by the men who had hidden near the shrine he would tell them readily about the box. He could say he was headed now for someone to tell, that he was glad he had stumbled upon them. But he had no faith in his ability to carry off this tale, and no faith in the good will of these men. Better, he knew, not to be caught."
Thomas Dunne Books, 2001
"In his flight he looked at his telltale trail through the snow with alarm. He struggled to form a plan.
Surely if someone has followed me, he thought, surely they'll stop to search the shrine. He knew that would take some time. He could count on some delay.
But in the very next instant he realized that the man with the glasses had claimed to see more than one man in the grove. If they divided, some of them might even then be gaining on him.
The youth saw now that he had been on a fool's errand, and this tired him further. He knew he had stayed too long in the shrine. Thinking back, he realized that the hole he dug searching for the packet would tell a plain tale. Having once uncovered the box, he could not now so readily rid himself of it....
He resolved that if he were caught by the men who had hidden near the shrine he would tell them readily about the box. He could say he was headed now for someone to tell, that he was glad he had stumbled upon them. But he had no faith in his ability to carry off this tale, and no faith in the good will of these men. Better, he knew, not to be caught."
Three Important Things
"Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind; the second is to be kind; and the third is to be kind.”
Henry James
No one knows this better than:
Tom Beckett (Soluble Census)
And blogging has never been warmer than this moment, since 2003. Tom's comments lead me to Imagine a world in which writers could say nice things to each other without tons of sarcastic icing.
*******************
Libby Found Guilty
CBS news.Thank you Mr.Fitzgerald!
Times coverage of Libby Verdict
One of the finest moments in judicial history since:
This
"Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind; the second is to be kind; and the third is to be kind.”
Henry James
No one knows this better than:
Tom Beckett (Soluble Census)
And blogging has never been warmer than this moment, since 2003. Tom's comments lead me to Imagine a world in which writers could say nice things to each other without tons of sarcastic icing.
*******************
Libby Found Guilty
CBS news.Thank you Mr.Fitzgerald!
Times coverage of Libby Verdict
One of the finest moments in judicial history since:
This
Monday, March 5
Thanks to
Jilly Dybka Poetry Hut
and Sandra Torres Gota a Gota (Drop by Drop) for their (recent)
links.
(The *fait accompli* link list will appear on this blog soon).
*********
Elwood P. Dowd (played by James Stewart) in *Harvey*: "Mother always said, in this life you must be either very smart or very pleasant. I tried smart for awhile, but then I switched to pleasant and I never regretted it."
"Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out."
Vaclav Havel
*************
from *Killing Floor* by Ray DiPalma
"FURTHER APOCRYPHA"
"Cries and processions put a public face on things;
this designation is corroborated only by silence
So I’ve been checking around for hints of evidence,
copied formulas, neutral grids blank and ancient,
organizing a memory to document,
as it passes into the listening,
—a surge of impressions
indifferent to fame and death—
that describe an answer but offer none
one dit issue seven Ray DiPalma
*******************
Shampoo 29 is here
******************
Between a Rock and a Hard Look
Went to a podiatrist once who told me things about orthotics- protective shoe inserts for your feet- I never knew. "Where've I been?" I said innocently. "Under a rock" he said, in a surprisingly nasty tone of voice. Well, maybe that's how you get from looking at people's feet all day. Actually he made a damn good pair of orthotics I stil use sometimes.
I, for one, until yesterday never got out from under my rock to take a good look at Big Bridge, or if I did, didn't bother to fully check it out. Here is the latest edition and all the earlier archives. The mag is well worth it, even if only for the many terrific author photos. Check out all the earlier editions at
Big Bridge archives
The current issue is here Big Bridge #12
By the way, I found out just how good Big Bridge is by discovering this terrific piece by Anne Waldman-
War Crime-
in
wood s lot (which is how I uisually try to
get out from under my rock, almost every day, and take a good hard look into the present and the past.)
Jilly Dybka Poetry Hut
and Sandra Torres Gota a Gota (Drop by Drop) for their (recent)
links.
(The *fait accompli* link list will appear on this blog soon).
*********
Elwood P. Dowd (played by James Stewart) in *Harvey*: "Mother always said, in this life you must be either very smart or very pleasant. I tried smart for awhile, but then I switched to pleasant and I never regretted it."
"Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out."
Vaclav Havel
*************
from *Killing Floor* by Ray DiPalma
"FURTHER APOCRYPHA"
"Cries and processions put a public face on things;
this designation is corroborated only by silence
So I’ve been checking around for hints of evidence,
copied formulas, neutral grids blank and ancient,
organizing a memory to document,
as it passes into the listening,
—a surge of impressions
indifferent to fame and death—
that describe an answer but offer none
one dit issue seven Ray DiPalma
*******************
Shampoo 29 is here
******************
Between a Rock and a Hard Look
Went to a podiatrist once who told me things about orthotics- protective shoe inserts for your feet- I never knew. "Where've I been?" I said innocently. "Under a rock" he said, in a surprisingly nasty tone of voice. Well, maybe that's how you get from looking at people's feet all day. Actually he made a damn good pair of orthotics I stil use sometimes.
I, for one, until yesterday never got out from under my rock to take a good look at Big Bridge, or if I did, didn't bother to fully check it out. Here is the latest edition and all the earlier archives. The mag is well worth it, even if only for the many terrific author photos. Check out all the earlier editions at
Big Bridge archives
The current issue is here Big Bridge #12
By the way, I found out just how good Big Bridge is by discovering this terrific piece by Anne Waldman-
War Crime-
in
wood s lot (which is how I uisually try to
get out from under my rock, almost every day, and take a good hard look into the present and the past.)
Sunday, March 4
Friends Indeed- Book Party Photos and Comments
Our belated (been out with a sore throat and a cold this week) yet enthusiastic thanks to
Nada Gordon (ululations)
and
Gary Sullivan (Elsewhere)
for their posts on our Unnameable (Adam's) Books book party on Tuesday, February 27.
and thanks to Adam Tobin for the terrific party celebrating *fait accompli* from Factory School
**
this just in from Adam Tobin
Dear dear friends of Unnameable Books,
You may have noticed some recent news coverage of this store, under a different name. If so, then you've probably been reading the New York Sun, or the Christian Science Monitor, or the Brooklyn Record or New York Magazine's gossip blog, or perhaps some other blogs where there have been high levels of chatter. Remain alert. Be aware of your surroundings at all times. Keen google use will reveal the following:
***
The Sun
The Record
The Monitor
The Intelligencer
The Compton
The King
The Elsewhere
The Tube
The Macondo
In other news: Spring is here (again), and the birds will sing. Soon, soon.
NEXT FRIDAY NIGHT, for example, THE CANARY himself, that caged wonder, containing new poems by Ashbery, Myles, Toufic, Lee etc., will send a representative: Mr. JOSHUA EDWARDS, Ed. He will be reading his own work.
Simultaneously: Mr. FRED SCHMALZ, editor of THE SWERVE, whose new issue arrives anon, will display his own clinamen in the back of the store.
And on the very same night: MATTHEW ROHRER, poet, will read from his new book RISE UP, newly out from Wave Books.
All this is just to say that:
FRIDAY MARCH 16th, at 8 PM,
A reading, a party, a reading party,
here at Unnameable Books. Featuring:
Joshua Edwards of THE CANARY
Fred Schmalz of THE SWERVE
and Matthew Rohrer of RISE UP.
456 Bergen St. (btw. Flatbush & 5th Ave.)
Joshua Edwards co-edits The Canary with Nick Twemlow and Anthony Robinson. His poems appear/are forthcoming in Vanitas, Practice, Court Green, Slate, Skanky Possum, 26, Colorado Review, and elsewhere. He lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Fred Schmalz is a poet and publisher of the literature and art journal swerve. His poems have appeared in The Bedazzler, jubilat, Conduit, Divide, Forklift Ohio, H_NGM_N and other magazines. Schmalz's chapbook Ticket was published by Fuori Editions in 2002. He lives in Brooklyn.
Matthew Rohrer is the author of A Green Light (Verse Press, 2004), which was shortlisted for the 2005 Griffin Poetry Prize. He is also the author of Satellite (Verse Press, 2001), and Nice Hat. Thanks. (with Joshua Beckman) (Verse Press, 2002) and the audio CD Adventures While Preaching the Gospel of Beauty (also with Joshua Beckman, 2003). He has appeared on NPR's "All
Things Considered" and "The Next Big Thing." His first book, A Hummock in the Malookas was selected for the National Poetry Series by Mary Oliver in 1994. He, too, lives in Brooklyn.
***
Unnameable Books
[formerly "Adam's"]
456 Bergen St.
Brooklyn, NY 11217
unnameablebooks@earthlink.net
(718) 789-1534
www.unnameablebooks.net
***
Amazon, schmamazon -- order your books from the Unnameable!
We'll give you 20% off, and can ship directly to you or your giftee.
We can order any book in print, and ship anywhere in the U.S.
Just send us an email with the word "Order" in the subject line...
***
Our belated (been out with a sore throat and a cold this week) yet enthusiastic thanks to
Nada Gordon (ululations)
and
Gary Sullivan (Elsewhere)
for their posts on our Unnameable (Adam's) Books book party on Tuesday, February 27.
and thanks to Adam Tobin for the terrific party celebrating *fait accompli* from Factory School
**
this just in from Adam Tobin
Dear dear friends of Unnameable Books,
You may have noticed some recent news coverage of this store, under a different name. If so, then you've probably been reading the New York Sun, or the Christian Science Monitor, or the Brooklyn Record or New York Magazine's gossip blog, or perhaps some other blogs where there have been high levels of chatter. Remain alert. Be aware of your surroundings at all times. Keen google use will reveal the following:
***
The Sun
The Record
The Monitor
The Intelligencer
The Compton
The King
The Elsewhere
The Tube
The Macondo
In other news: Spring is here (again), and the birds will sing. Soon, soon.
NEXT FRIDAY NIGHT, for example, THE CANARY himself, that caged wonder, containing new poems by Ashbery, Myles, Toufic, Lee etc., will send a representative: Mr. JOSHUA EDWARDS, Ed. He will be reading his own work.
Simultaneously: Mr. FRED SCHMALZ, editor of THE SWERVE, whose new issue arrives anon, will display his own clinamen in the back of the store.
And on the very same night: MATTHEW ROHRER, poet, will read from his new book RISE UP, newly out from Wave Books.
All this is just to say that:
FRIDAY MARCH 16th, at 8 PM,
A reading, a party, a reading party,
here at Unnameable Books. Featuring:
Joshua Edwards of THE CANARY
Fred Schmalz of THE SWERVE
and Matthew Rohrer of RISE UP.
456 Bergen St. (btw. Flatbush & 5th Ave.)
Joshua Edwards co-edits The Canary with Nick Twemlow and Anthony Robinson. His poems appear/are forthcoming in Vanitas, Practice, Court Green, Slate, Skanky Possum, 26, Colorado Review, and elsewhere. He lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Fred Schmalz is a poet and publisher of the literature and art journal swerve. His poems have appeared in The Bedazzler, jubilat, Conduit, Divide, Forklift Ohio, H_NGM_N and other magazines. Schmalz's chapbook Ticket was published by Fuori Editions in 2002. He lives in Brooklyn.
Matthew Rohrer is the author of A Green Light (Verse Press, 2004), which was shortlisted for the 2005 Griffin Poetry Prize. He is also the author of Satellite (Verse Press, 2001), and Nice Hat. Thanks. (with Joshua Beckman) (Verse Press, 2002) and the audio CD Adventures While Preaching the Gospel of Beauty (also with Joshua Beckman, 2003). He has appeared on NPR's "All
Things Considered" and "The Next Big Thing." His first book, A Hummock in the Malookas was selected for the National Poetry Series by Mary Oliver in 1994. He, too, lives in Brooklyn.
***
Unnameable Books
[formerly "Adam's"]
456 Bergen St.
Brooklyn, NY 11217
unnameablebooks@earthlink.net
(718) 789-1534
www.unnameablebooks.net
***
Amazon, schmamazon -- order your books from the Unnameable!
We'll give you 20% off, and can ship directly to you or your giftee.
We can order any book in print, and ship anywhere in the U.S.
Just send us an email with the word "Order" in the subject line...
***
Tuesday, February 27
Contradicta
Anyone can easily appear supremely sophisticated and all-knowing by understating or witholding their reactions. LIke death, another masterful leveler, silence obliterates all distinction by remaining cool and unimpressed.
***************************
Irony, the shield and sword of literary politics, ends its days living alone on one side of the moon, while its polar opposite, sentimentality, assumes its solo residence on the other.
Anyone can easily appear supremely sophisticated and all-knowing by understating or witholding their reactions. LIke death, another masterful leveler, silence obliterates all distinction by remaining cool and unimpressed.
***************************
Irony, the shield and sword of literary politics, ends its days living alone on one side of the moon, while its polar opposite, sentimentality, assumes its solo residence on the other.
Book Party Today
Please come celebrate the publication of *fait accompli* (with an afterword by Gary Sullivan) from Factory School's Heretical Texts
Heretical Texts' *fait accompli*
TUESDAY, February 27
at 8pm.
at UNNAMEABLE BOOKS
456 Bergen Street
Brooklyn NY 11217
(off Flatbush Avenue)
(718) 789 1534
Easy* to get to. Take the 2 or 3 train to Bergen street stop (not to be confused with the other Bergen stop on the F line). Unnameable Books is just 1/2 block from the subway. Pinchik paint is on the corner.* Bergen is one stop past the Atlantic AND Pacific St transfer point with the D,M,N,R and B,Q,2,3,4,5 lines
Please come celebrate the publication of *fait accompli* (with an afterword by Gary Sullivan) from Factory School's Heretical Texts
Heretical Texts' *fait accompli*
TUESDAY, February 27
at 8pm.
at UNNAMEABLE BOOKS
456 Bergen Street
Brooklyn NY 11217
(off Flatbush Avenue)
(718) 789 1534
Easy* to get to. Take the 2 or 3 train to Bergen street stop (not to be confused with the other Bergen stop on the F line). Unnameable Books is just 1/2 block from the subway. Pinchik paint is on the corner.* Bergen is one stop past the Atlantic AND Pacific St transfer point with the D,M,N,R and B,Q,2,3,4,5 lines
Sunday, February 25
Mark Young announces new books from
Otoliths
I am pleased to announce the first of what will be a quarterly round of new books from Otoliths ; & I'm extremely pleased that the four books in this initial launch are wonderful offerings by four exceptional poets.
Rather than drool with unadulterated joy any further, I'll just point you to the Otoliths shopfront — Lulu Shopfront — where you can also find other books & chapbooks plus print versions of the magazine, & would suggest to U.S. residents that, rather than use couriers, they select the USPS Media Mail default as the means of delivery since it's economical &, from our experience, efficient.
The individual webpages for each of the books is given below.
Nico Vassilakis: DIPTYCHS
60 pages, full colour
$15.00
webpage:
Lulu ordering page
"The individual pieces in this book are tiny visual poems that examine the materiality of visible language and find beauty by looking at that language from unexpected vantage points. Nico has created each of these poems through a sequence of steps that included capturing video of text, editing and modifying that video (which included changing the color), capturing screenshots of the video, and cutting and putting these final pieces together in little diptychs consisting of one rectangle of prepared text atop another. To some degree, the results are the children of Nico's important videopoetic work, Concrete: Movies, released in 2005."
—from the introduction by Geof Huth
Jordan Stempleman: What's the Matter
112 pages
$10.00
webpage: Lulu ordering page
"Maximizing the tension of line breaks, making the most of each word's nuances, Jordan Stempleman creates a stunning landscape of precision and delicacy. There are gorgeous moments here, and they always "begin with the actual condition"—this book constitutes a commitment to the beauty of the world, and a new instance of it."
— Cole Swensen
"In this impressive, replete collection, Jordan Stempleman takes us repeatedly to this place of contemplation, where only a few rare words are necessary. We are invited to a course of thinking that locates intensity without demanding it—for therein lies the fabled difference between an exploratory and settled poetics, to open out and out again upon present history. This is, quite simply, a wonderful book."
— Paul Hoover
harry k stammer: tents
60 pages, including colour
$15.00
webpage: Lulu ordering page
"Make no mistake about it: harry k. stammer is one of the boldest pioneers in contemporary experimental poetry—and one of the most successful. His new work tents is edgy but accessible; challenging but rewarding. stammer mixes a sort of poetic cubism with wordplay, startling typography, and a wide array of other adventurous techniques with creative intensity rarely witnessed. In this singular text, the reader is confronted by a dizzying maelstrom of meaning and image. Kaleidoscopic and impressionistic, this interpretation of our postindustrial, postmodern society is a must for any serious reader of today's poetry."
–Philip Primeau , PERSISTENCIA* PRESS
Vernon Frazer: BODIED TONE
132 pages
$10.00
webpage: Lulu ordering page
" BODIED TONE is terrific—the rhythmic vitality is just that, full of life, but it is seductive too; one gets caught up in the percussive musicality of the phrasing . It's a driving musicality—more bebop than balladry, for sure." — Lyn Hejinian
So why not splurge a little & be swept up by pleasure.
Cheers
Mark Young
Editor, Otoliths
Otoliths
I am pleased to announce the first of what will be a quarterly round of new books from Otoliths ; & I'm extremely pleased that the four books in this initial launch are wonderful offerings by four exceptional poets.
Rather than drool with unadulterated joy any further, I'll just point you to the Otoliths shopfront — Lulu Shopfront — where you can also find other books & chapbooks plus print versions of the magazine, & would suggest to U.S. residents that, rather than use couriers, they select the USPS Media Mail default as the means of delivery since it's economical &, from our experience, efficient.
The individual webpages for each of the books is given below.
Nico Vassilakis: DIPTYCHS
60 pages, full colour
$15.00
webpage:
Lulu ordering page
"The individual pieces in this book are tiny visual poems that examine the materiality of visible language and find beauty by looking at that language from unexpected vantage points. Nico has created each of these poems through a sequence of steps that included capturing video of text, editing and modifying that video (which included changing the color), capturing screenshots of the video, and cutting and putting these final pieces together in little diptychs consisting of one rectangle of prepared text atop another. To some degree, the results are the children of Nico's important videopoetic work, Concrete: Movies, released in 2005."
—from the introduction by Geof Huth
Jordan Stempleman: What's the Matter
112 pages
$10.00
webpage: Lulu ordering page
"Maximizing the tension of line breaks, making the most of each word's nuances, Jordan Stempleman creates a stunning landscape of precision and delicacy. There are gorgeous moments here, and they always "begin with the actual condition"—this book constitutes a commitment to the beauty of the world, and a new instance of it."
— Cole Swensen
"In this impressive, replete collection, Jordan Stempleman takes us repeatedly to this place of contemplation, where only a few rare words are necessary. We are invited to a course of thinking that locates intensity without demanding it—for therein lies the fabled difference between an exploratory and settled poetics, to open out and out again upon present history. This is, quite simply, a wonderful book."
— Paul Hoover
harry k stammer: tents
60 pages, including colour
$15.00
webpage: Lulu ordering page
"Make no mistake about it: harry k. stammer is one of the boldest pioneers in contemporary experimental poetry—and one of the most successful. His new work tents is edgy but accessible; challenging but rewarding. stammer mixes a sort of poetic cubism with wordplay, startling typography, and a wide array of other adventurous techniques with creative intensity rarely witnessed. In this singular text, the reader is confronted by a dizzying maelstrom of meaning and image. Kaleidoscopic and impressionistic, this interpretation of our postindustrial, postmodern society is a must for any serious reader of today's poetry."
–Philip Primeau , PERSISTENCIA* PRESS
Vernon Frazer: BODIED TONE
132 pages
$10.00
webpage: Lulu ordering page
" BODIED TONE is terrific—the rhythmic vitality is just that, full of life, but it is seductive too; one gets caught up in the percussive musicality of the phrasing . It's a driving musicality—more bebop than balladry, for sure." — Lyn Hejinian
So why not splurge a little & be swept up by pleasure.
Cheers
Mark Young
Editor, Otoliths
Saturday, February 24
Guilermo Parra has posted a
review of Heriberto Yepez's new Heretical Texts book on his blog
Venepoetics
review of Heriberto Yepez's new Heretical Texts book on his blog
Venepoetics
Friday, February 23
Thanks Across the East River and Across the Atlantic
to
Anny Ballardini and Thom Donovan for their generous responses to *fait accompli* from Heretical Texts; Anny presents some random selections, and an invitation to our upcoming book party at Unnameable Books in Brooklyn and Thom Donovan presents a dedicated poem and a collage from *Free Fall* "Chris Dangerous." Much appreciated, guys!
*****
Laura Moriarty reviews Heriberto Yepez's *Wars. Threesomes. Drafts. & Mothers* from Heretical Texts in
A Tonalist Notes
via Orbit Now (Troy Worman)
Heriberto Yepez also posted it on his blog Hecho en Hache
to
Anny Ballardini and Thom Donovan for their generous responses to *fait accompli* from Heretical Texts; Anny presents some random selections, and an invitation to our upcoming book party at Unnameable Books in Brooklyn and Thom Donovan presents a dedicated poem and a collage from *Free Fall* "Chris Dangerous." Much appreciated, guys!
*****
Laura Moriarty reviews Heriberto Yepez's *Wars. Threesomes. Drafts. & Mothers* from Heretical Texts in
A Tonalist Notes
via Orbit Now (Troy Worman)
Heriberto Yepez also posted it on his blog Hecho en Hache
Thursday, February 22
Tuesday, February 20
Sunday, February 18
Another fait accompli
Bill Marsh, editor of the Heretical Texts series- that now includes the book version of *fait accompli*- reviewed this blog in June of 2003. We tried to convince Bill to use this review as a preface to the book, but since Gary Sullivan had already kindly supplied an afterword it was clear this was far too much packaging for an Heretical Texts book. Below is a link to Bill Marsh's review on his blog San Diego Poetry Guild.
Bill and his wife Octavia Davis and their two children have now moved to Jackson Heights, Queens, although they then resided in Southern California. Bill, and soon Octavia, teach at St John's. He is working on a book about plagiarism. The Factory School design team that includes Joel Kuszai and Octavia Davis did a presentation at the Poetry Project last Monday.
Field Report #1 by Bill Marsh
**
Thanks to Ernesto Priego (Never Neutral) for the generous response to *fait accompli*
Bill Marsh, editor of the Heretical Texts series- that now includes the book version of *fait accompli*- reviewed this blog in June of 2003. We tried to convince Bill to use this review as a preface to the book, but since Gary Sullivan had already kindly supplied an afterword it was clear this was far too much packaging for an Heretical Texts book. Below is a link to Bill Marsh's review on his blog San Diego Poetry Guild.
Bill and his wife Octavia Davis and their two children have now moved to Jackson Heights, Queens, although they then resided in Southern California. Bill, and soon Octavia, teach at St John's. He is working on a book about plagiarism. The Factory School design team that includes Joel Kuszai and Octavia Davis did a presentation at the Poetry Project last Monday.
Field Report #1 by Bill Marsh
**
Thanks to Ernesto Priego (Never Neutral) for the generous response to *fait accompli*
Saturday, February 17
Holland Cotter featured Mimi Gross' painting
-which we saw and greatly admired at the Ceres opening
last night- (Ceres Gallery:547 West 27th Street)
in the Friday, February 16 NY Times Art section
Agents of Change: Women, Art and Intellect
that included a link to the
The Meaning Forum
which features a painting by Toni Simon!
**
Contradicta recently Translated Into Icelandic!
Thanks to
Tiubusund tregawott for the link.
PS Shanna Compton featured on the same site.
***************
SPD has sold out the first shipment of *fait accompli* from Heretical Texts.
Until some have been shipped you can order from this page:
Factory School
-which we saw and greatly admired at the Ceres opening
last night- (Ceres Gallery:547 West 27th Street)
in the Friday, February 16 NY Times Art section
Agents of Change: Women, Art and Intellect
that included a link to the
The Meaning Forum
which features a painting by Toni Simon!
**
Contradicta recently Translated Into Icelandic!
Thanks to
Tiubusund tregawott for the link.
PS Shanna Compton featured on the same site.
***************
SPD has sold out the first shipment of *fait accompli* from Heretical Texts.
Until some have been shipped you can order from this page:
Factory School
Tuesday, February 13
This Side of Paradise
"Q- Do you want a lot of money?
A- No. I am merely afraid of being poor.
Q- Very afraid?
A- Just passively afraid.
Q- Where are you drifting?
A- Don't ask *me*!
Q- Don't you care?
A- Rather. I don't want to commit moral suicide.
Q- Have you no interests left?
A- None, I have no more virtue to lose. Just as a cooling pot gives off no more heat, so all through youth and adolescence we give off calories of virtue. That's what's called ingenuousness.
Q- An interesting idea.
A- That's why a good man going wrong attracts people.They stand around literally *warm themselves* at the calories of virtue he gives off. Sarah makes an unsophisticated remark and the faces simper in delight-'How *innocent* the poor child is!' They're warming themselves at her virtue. But Sarah sees the simper and never makes the remark again. Only she feels a little colder after that."
-F.Scott Fitzgerald
*This Side of Paradise* was Fitzgerald's first book, begun when he was still a Princeton undergraduate and published when he was 23.
"Q- Do you want a lot of money?
A- No. I am merely afraid of being poor.
Q- Very afraid?
A- Just passively afraid.
Q- Where are you drifting?
A- Don't ask *me*!
Q- Don't you care?
A- Rather. I don't want to commit moral suicide.
Q- Have you no interests left?
A- None, I have no more virtue to lose. Just as a cooling pot gives off no more heat, so all through youth and adolescence we give off calories of virtue. That's what's called ingenuousness.
Q- An interesting idea.
A- That's why a good man going wrong attracts people.They stand around literally *warm themselves* at the calories of virtue he gives off. Sarah makes an unsophisticated remark and the faces simper in delight-'How *innocent* the poor child is!' They're warming themselves at her virtue. But Sarah sees the simper and never makes the remark again. Only she feels a little colder after that."
-F.Scott Fitzgerald
*This Side of Paradise* was Fitzgerald's first book, begun when he was still a Princeton undergraduate and published when he was 23.
Sunday, February 11
Today is fait accompli's 4th birthday.
Come celebrate the publication of *fait accompli* the book-
from Factory School's Heretical Texts
at Unnameable Books
456 Bergen Street
(off Flatbush Avenue)
Tuesday, February 27
at 8pm.
The book begins with our first post
on this date in 2003.
**
^Gary Sullivan, The Great Enabler*
Stan Apps posted a personal and passionate essay about Gary Sullivan's poetics-
"Gary’s poetics consists of decisively rejecting mysterious theatricality, and thereby creating an aesthetic of material accountability. The words in Flarf poems are materials that have been put there precisely so that a mysterious theatrical tone of all-knowingness from the beyond cannot develop. Instead, evidence of human foolishness and goofiness is there instead. The tone of Flarf poems is not really (or not only) a tone of willed outrageousness or silliness, as it may seem to be; the tone is a rejection of mysteriousness, and therefore an acceptance of words and phrases that can be accounted for as merely human..."
read the entire post right now on
refried ORACLE phone
**
Digitalized Thought from Peter Ciccariello [via the
Buffalo Poetics List]
Come celebrate the publication of *fait accompli* the book-
from Factory School's Heretical Texts
at Unnameable Books
456 Bergen Street
(off Flatbush Avenue)
Tuesday, February 27
at 8pm.
The book begins with our first post
on this date in 2003.
**
^Gary Sullivan, The Great Enabler*
Stan Apps posted a personal and passionate essay about Gary Sullivan's poetics-
"Gary’s poetics consists of decisively rejecting mysterious theatricality, and thereby creating an aesthetic of material accountability. The words in Flarf poems are materials that have been put there precisely so that a mysterious theatrical tone of all-knowingness from the beyond cannot develop. Instead, evidence of human foolishness and goofiness is there instead. The tone of Flarf poems is not really (or not only) a tone of willed outrageousness or silliness, as it may seem to be; the tone is a rejection of mysteriousness, and therefore an acceptance of words and phrases that can be accounted for as merely human..."
read the entire post right now on
refried ORACLE phone
**
Digitalized Thought from Peter Ciccariello [via the
Buffalo Poetics List]
Saturday, February 10
Thursday, February 8
Lou-Andreas Salome meets Kenny Goldsmith
(an article in the Valve by Ray Davis) (Nov, 2005)
Salome What She Watched
**
updated factory schooll link to ::fait accompli:: the book:
fait accompli from Heretical Texts
(an article in the Valve by Ray Davis) (Nov, 2005)
Salome What She Watched
**
updated factory schooll link to ::fait accompli:: the book:
fait accompli from Heretical Texts
Wednesday, February 7
Tuesday, February 6
Thanks to
incli(NATION)
for the link to our Walter Benjamin and Blogging post from Dec 12, 2003, and to Mark Woods and Theresa Duncan for their recent links.
incli(NATION)
for the link to our Walter Benjamin and Blogging post from Dec 12, 2003, and to Mark Woods and Theresa Duncan for their recent links.
Sunday, February 4
Subject: Book Party for ::fait accompli:: from Heretical Texts
Place: Adam's Books/ aka Unnameable Books
456 Bergen Street, off Flatbush Avenue, Brooklyn
tel: (718) 789-1534
Date:Tuesday, February 27
Time: 8 PM
Please come!
::fait accompli::
from Heretical Texts
**
Thanks to
The Wit of The Staircase for the link to ::fait accompli:: on Walter Benjamin and Blogging (2003). Nice bit of time travel! (via wood s lot])
[Benjamin on Blogging was posted to
fait accompli Dec 12, 2003]
Place: Adam's Books/ aka Unnameable Books
456 Bergen Street, off Flatbush Avenue, Brooklyn
tel: (718) 789-1534
Date:Tuesday, February 27
Time: 8 PM
Please come!
::fait accompli::
from Heretical Texts
**
Thanks to
The Wit of The Staircase for the link to ::fait accompli:: on Walter Benjamin and Blogging (2003). Nice bit of time travel! (via wood s lot])
[Benjamin on Blogging was posted to
fait accompli Dec 12, 2003]
Friday, February 2
Thanks to
Nico Vassilakis, Tom Murphy [click here]
and wood s lot [click here]
for the kind words about ::fait acccompli:: from Heretical Texts!
**
SPD *fait accompli* listing
Nico Vassilakis, Tom Murphy [click here]
and wood s lot [click here]
for the kind words about ::fait acccompli:: from Heretical Texts!
**
SPD *fait accompli* listing
Thursday, February 1
Tom Beckett {Soluble Census) [click here] has some kind words to say about *fait accompli* from Heretical Texts.
Thanks, Tom!
Thanks, Tom!
Saturday, January 27
*fait accompli* has a new look, due to changes at blogger.
Work to be done.
Keep tuned. New Contradicta will hopefully be
posted soon.
**
Thanks to
Glee Farm (Todd Colby) [click here] for the recent link.
Work to be done.
Keep tuned. New Contradicta will hopefully be
posted soon.
**
Thanks to
Glee Farm (Todd Colby) [click here] for the recent link.
Tuesday, January 23
*fait accompli* is available now from Factory School
or SPD
*fait accompli* from Heretical Texts [click here]
Heretical Texts Volumes 1-3 [click here]
or SPD
*fait accompli* from Heretical Texts [click here]
Heretical Texts Volumes 1-3 [click here]
Sunday, January 14
Friday, January 12
Monday, January 8
Saturday, January 6
Wednesday, January 3
Contradicta
Take care not to acquire too many cold friends, as you must become like them. In this realm cold transfers more quickly than warmth, and more permanently.
***************************
In people. coldness has the advantage of anaesthetizing pain. These folks take the greatest delight in their ambitions and their advantages over others, despite whatever generosity they put on display.
Take care not to acquire too many cold friends, as you must become like them. In this realm cold transfers more quickly than warmth, and more permanently.
***************************
In people. coldness has the advantage of anaesthetizing pain. These folks take the greatest delight in their ambitions and their advantages over others, despite whatever generosity they put on display.
Wednesday, December 27
Saturday, December 23
Friday, December 22
Contradicta
Contemptuous attitudes towards the rewards of old age- devoted spouse and friends, reputation, security, wisdom- spring easily from the mouths of the young, and, in fact, sound better coming from them.
**************************
Despair over time passing is a quickening plunge that only insight can throttle.
Contemptuous attitudes towards the rewards of old age- devoted spouse and friends, reputation, security, wisdom- spring easily from the mouths of the young, and, in fact, sound better coming from them.
**************************
Despair over time passing is a quickening plunge that only insight can throttle.
Tuesday, December 19
Contradicta: A Fugue
1. Allegro Con Brio
There is nothing more dissonant with literary creation than a feeling of pure joy. To be experienced these feelings must settle a bit and then be ...marinated, like an assemblage of tasty spices, meats and potatoes.This shows that to be properly tasted a happy moment must be dressed and costumed. Happiness can be consumed only after it has begun to be forgotten, which then entitles it to be resurrected and recounted. So first, it is to be over (finished) stuffed, (mummified), dressed (exhibited).Only now it is eligible to be contemplated. Acordingly, the best representative of happiness is well dressed mannikin.
2. Largo assai
Enjoyment is an internal experience. For it to be recognized as such, it must be discussed. This discussion leads to at least partially dissecting the experience to examine its parts. Once the comparison comes the constituents are categorized.This is the equivalent of freezing portions of the dinner for later consumption. Now one can peacefully consider how the pleasure will be consummated later. To open the refrigerator is one of the contemplative's ideal glimpses of joy.
3. Coda: adagio
When something annoying happens it brings it its wake a miniature storm or tiny hurricane of emotion that momentarily distorts time. For a split second any expectable sequence appears unlikely to occur. In order for an annoyance to be realized one must want to refuse the action that was to follow. The life of an irritable or anxious hour consists of a sequnce of innumerable small tears or breaks in the unfolding of the fabric of being. Then the accompaniment of an irritating feeling of disappointment. Then a hesitation or a blank space offering a space for the possibility of a new motif, or a sustained time of contrapuntal memories.
1. Allegro Con Brio
There is nothing more dissonant with literary creation than a feeling of pure joy. To be experienced these feelings must settle a bit and then be ...marinated, like an assemblage of tasty spices, meats and potatoes.This shows that to be properly tasted a happy moment must be dressed and costumed. Happiness can be consumed only after it has begun to be forgotten, which then entitles it to be resurrected and recounted. So first, it is to be over (finished) stuffed, (mummified), dressed (exhibited).Only now it is eligible to be contemplated. Acordingly, the best representative of happiness is well dressed mannikin.
2. Largo assai
Enjoyment is an internal experience. For it to be recognized as such, it must be discussed. This discussion leads to at least partially dissecting the experience to examine its parts. Once the comparison comes the constituents are categorized.This is the equivalent of freezing portions of the dinner for later consumption. Now one can peacefully consider how the pleasure will be consummated later. To open the refrigerator is one of the contemplative's ideal glimpses of joy.
3. Coda: adagio
When something annoying happens it brings it its wake a miniature storm or tiny hurricane of emotion that momentarily distorts time. For a split second any expectable sequence appears unlikely to occur. In order for an annoyance to be realized one must want to refuse the action that was to follow. The life of an irritable or anxious hour consists of a sequnce of innumerable small tears or breaks in the unfolding of the fabric of being. Then the accompaniment of an irritating feeling of disappointment. Then a hesitation or a blank space offering a space for the possibility of a new motif, or a sustained time of contrapuntal memories.
Saturday, December 16
Wednesday, December 13
Saturday, December 9
Contradicta
Every moment you have ever lived lives on, and will one day visit or receive you, if only you would make it welcome.
*************************
Ride Pegasus hard into the present so its wings can sweep the future and the past.
**
Boppin' at the Bowery PC
Last night's reading/ book party at the Bowery Poetry Club for Elaine Equi and Patricia Smith's new Coffee House Books was introduced by the mighty Bob Holman. Before the reading, Bob had noticed that he and Toni were both wearing Yoko Ono *Imagine Peace* buttons and then he remembered that the date, December 8th, was the day John Lennon died 26 years ago. (By the way, Toni and I had just come from the opening of the PS 122 benefit where my collage *Di Pace*(*Of Peace*) was newly on display.) Bob's observation was moving, as were his introductions for both Patricia Smith (her new Coffee House book is titled *Teahouse of the Almighty*) and Elaine Equi (her forthcoming title is *Ripple Effect: New and Selected Poems*). Both readings were excellent. Elaine read some of her greatest hits, including her confessional poem about her life being, unfortunately, not sinful enough, including a line that read approximately -"my father did not even find me exciting enough to molest me"; and *Detail*, about the particularly inspiring beauty of details of paintings in art books; and a pair of poems in pink, for her friend David Trinidad who had promised to read a poem for her decked out in the same color that same night. Patricia Smith read a memorably powerful poem composed of 34 haiku-like miniature dramas, concerning the innumerable tragedies surrounding hurricane Katrina, as well as other body and soul jolting lyrics . Bob Holman was at his maximum witty, inviting all to order some of the revolutionary war style mulled wine called *Glug* available at the bar, and introducing Allan Kornblum, as the publisher of Coffee House books, "where the corn blooms."
Every moment you have ever lived lives on, and will one day visit or receive you, if only you would make it welcome.
*************************
Ride Pegasus hard into the present so its wings can sweep the future and the past.
**
Boppin' at the Bowery PC
Last night's reading/ book party at the Bowery Poetry Club for Elaine Equi and Patricia Smith's new Coffee House Books was introduced by the mighty Bob Holman. Before the reading, Bob had noticed that he and Toni were both wearing Yoko Ono *Imagine Peace* buttons and then he remembered that the date, December 8th, was the day John Lennon died 26 years ago. (By the way, Toni and I had just come from the opening of the PS 122 benefit where my collage *Di Pace*(*Of Peace*) was newly on display.) Bob's observation was moving, as were his introductions for both Patricia Smith (her new Coffee House book is titled *Teahouse of the Almighty*) and Elaine Equi (her forthcoming title is *Ripple Effect: New and Selected Poems*). Both readings were excellent. Elaine read some of her greatest hits, including her confessional poem about her life being, unfortunately, not sinful enough, including a line that read approximately -"my father did not even find me exciting enough to molest me"; and *Detail*, about the particularly inspiring beauty of details of paintings in art books; and a pair of poems in pink, for her friend David Trinidad who had promised to read a poem for her decked out in the same color that same night. Patricia Smith read a memorably powerful poem composed of 34 haiku-like miniature dramas, concerning the innumerable tragedies surrounding hurricane Katrina, as well as other body and soul jolting lyrics . Bob Holman was at his maximum witty, inviting all to order some of the revolutionary war style mulled wine called *Glug* available at the bar, and introducing Allan Kornblum, as the publisher of Coffee House books, "where the corn blooms."
Friday, December 8
Wednesday, December 6
Sunday, December 3
Contradicta
After you've read poetry long enough, with each successive reading you understand more of the magician's tricks. At this stage you read more to understand the poet than the poem because poets have infinitely more tricks up their sleeves than their poems.
**********************
Confess you were wrong and gain affection- profess you were right and lose it.
After you've read poetry long enough, with each successive reading you understand more of the magician's tricks. At this stage you read more to understand the poet than the poem because poets have infinitely more tricks up their sleeves than their poems.
**********************
Confess you were wrong and gain affection- profess you were right and lose it.
Friday, December 1
Tuesday, November 28
Monday, November 27
Sunday, November 26
Saturday, November 25
Friday, November 24
Monday, November 20
Sunday, November 19
*Original Presence* by Laynie Browne
Octopuswoman [click here]
is one of 12 illustrations by Toni Simon from Laynie Browne's new book of poetry *Original Presence* just published by Shivastan [click here] on handmade paper in Nepal.
"Upon recitation of the verses of the sea
Listeners gather their hems above the salty foam"
The mind's truth needs fiction's face.
Octopuswoman [click here]
is one of 12 illustrations by Toni Simon from Laynie Browne's new book of poetry *Original Presence* just published by Shivastan [click here] on handmade paper in Nepal.
"Upon recitation of the verses of the sea
Listeners gather their hems above the salty foam"
The mind's truth needs fiction's face.
Saturday, November 18
Thursday, November 16
Tuesday, November 14
Monday, November 13
Saturday, November 11
Friday, November 10
Thursday, November 9
Wednesday, November 8
Tuesday, November 7
Monday, November 6
Saturday, November 4
Friday, November 3
Thursday, November 2
Monday, October 30
Saturday, October 28
Friday, October 27
Wednesday, October 25
Contradicta
Just as there are shrewd animals who fake death in order to deceive predators, there are artists who feign failure in order to elude imitators. This device does not discourage the bottom feeders, however.
************************
One might as well cloak one's generosity in an air of indifference, since where kindness is viewed as weakness, loneliness prevails.
Just as there are shrewd animals who fake death in order to deceive predators, there are artists who feign failure in order to elude imitators. This device does not discourage the bottom feeders, however.
************************
One might as well cloak one's generosity in an air of indifference, since where kindness is viewed as weakness, loneliness prevails.
Tuesday, October 24
Contradicta
Victors are careful to conceal their disillusionment with the rules of the games they wish to win. "Confidence" is at the heart of this charade.
*****************************
Artists must get lost in order to discover anything as the freeways lead only to gas stations, malls and parking lots.
Victors are careful to conceal their disillusionment with the rules of the games they wish to win. "Confidence" is at the heart of this charade.
*****************************
Artists must get lost in order to discover anything as the freeways lead only to gas stations, malls and parking lots.
Monday, October 23
Contradicta
As writers climb the ladder to success they are wise to shed their feelings because the clouds, for example, that appear so substantial from below, from the top rung appear flat, where it also lonely because there is only room for one. This is a dilemma, however, for their readers, who expect to feel something in order to be convinced, when they read it, that the work remains substantial.
**********************
Friendship is a game of chess that should be played more gently and appreciatively as time goes on, otherwise the opponants will deprive themselves of the partners who have so steadily inspired them.
As writers climb the ladder to success they are wise to shed their feelings because the clouds, for example, that appear so substantial from below, from the top rung appear flat, where it also lonely because there is only room for one. This is a dilemma, however, for their readers, who expect to feel something in order to be convinced, when they read it, that the work remains substantial.
**********************
Friendship is a game of chess that should be played more gently and appreciatively as time goes on, otherwise the opponants will deprive themselves of the partners who have so steadily inspired them.
Sunday, October 22
Friday, October 20
Thursday, October 19
Wednesday, October 18
Contradicta
To tolerate one's own suffering or that of others without trying or at least wishing to reduce it is itself a kind of evil because, as suffering grows, so does evil.
***************************
Celebrities who are prolific and talk freely inspire affection because they give the impression that at any moment they might blurt out the secrets of their success.
To tolerate one's own suffering or that of others without trying or at least wishing to reduce it is itself a kind of evil because, as suffering grows, so does evil.
***************************
Celebrities who are prolific and talk freely inspire affection because they give the impression that at any moment they might blurt out the secrets of their success.
Tuesday, October 17
Contradicta
Strength is as important for love as kindness since it is as crucial to challenge the neglect of those whose love we want as it is to challenge our own neglect of those who want our love.
**************************
Perhaps before photography, prior to the omnipresence of the pose, people looked- and therefore felt- more like themselves.
Strength is as important for love as kindness since it is as crucial to challenge the neglect of those whose love we want as it is to challenge our own neglect of those who want our love.
**************************
Perhaps before photography, prior to the omnipresence of the pose, people looked- and therefore felt- more like themselves.
Monday, October 16
Friday, October 13
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