AN INTRODUCTION & AN AFFIRMATION

There's a LOT of goooood stuff in the second issue of Otoliths--kudos to editor/publisher Mark Young. For me, there was at least an introduction and an affirmation.

The intro: Caleb Puckett, by which I mean I'd not read his words before but I love what I read in Otoliths. Like this:

Once upon a time in a muddy black land where something as simple as a missed note on a harmonica could ruin a man’s reputation, you turned back and forgot your revenge. You had too much too lose, especially considering that you had that national surgeon’s conference to chair in the near future. Especially considering that she would soon be nothing but a broken blade of grass beneath a rusted lawn chair leg. Especially since assault, let alone murder, could lead to such dire turns on the wheel of life. Especially considering that we mark time with more than one tense, direction in more ways than left and right, and action in a number of fashions—least of which is the intention—as its wobbly spokes spin through history. Though thought may ultimately satisfy through ferocious fiction, its greatest sin seems so slight compared to an honest assault. You want no more misery, so you decide this is the part where you whistle Dixie like it is Mozart.
--from "The Assault" by Caleb Puckett

Then there's David Baptiste-Chirot. So glad to see the discussion by Geoff Huth and then David himself.

I could write reams about how much I appreciate David's work. But it'd be reams of silence. So let me just approximate my appreciation by saying: The way David Baptiste-Chirot creates -- HOW he does it -- is very important to me, and even as I don't claim to know/understand all of his process, his process is a source of spiritual sustenance.

SOMETIMES, THE WATER WILL NOT CHANGE INTO WINE

Eric writes what I won't -- can't -- on Qana (aka Cana):


Qana
By Eric Gamalinda

There's a room that no one enters.

Inside that room there's a woman

who's been absorbed by all that space.

Inside that woman there's a generation

no longer used to miracles,

there's a child whose gestures

are extinguished, already null.

Take another look:

underneath the rubble a room,

inside the room a woman,

inside the woman a parable

of providence already out

of date, the gift of the marvelous,

one evening drunk with love.

Once more:

a room, a woman, something small

and without a voice, who will perhaps

still find among the ruins

this ramshackle earth that suffers

from suffering. For peace is not

what it used to be, it is the future

made perfect by absence,

by obliteration. Our cruelty

is efficient, precise.

Look closer: the water

will not change to wine.

"MELANCHOLIA'S TREMULOUS DREADLOCKS"--BRAND SPANKIN' NEW!

Poet/editor/publisher Andrew Lundwall's historic announcement. And if you click to read my poems, you get the bonus of seeing my beloved Achilles!!!! as he accompanies me on my poet lariat-ship duties in wine country!.

From Andrew:

http://www.melancholiastremulousdreadlocks.com

the first ever issue of melancholia's tremulous dreadlocks is online now...

poets featured in this edition of mtd:

mIEKAL aND!
John M. Bennett!
Marcia Arrieta!
Petra Backonja!
Anny Ballardini!
Bob Marcacci!
Robert Chrysler!
kari edwards!
Alex Gildzen!
Johannes Goransson!
Richard Denner!
Jeff Harrison!
Chris Toll!
Eileen Tabios!
Lina Ramona Vitkauskas!

please visit:
http://www.melancholiastremulousdreadlocks.com/

cheers!
andrew lundwall

MOI CHERRY IS SWEET

for more reasons than one. The first is A Slice of Cherry Pie: A poetry chapbook anthology inspired by David Lynch's Twin Peaks series, Edited by Ivy Alvarez. You can have a slice of moi cherry viz this unique publication; pre-ordering information here:

And another reason for sweetness is, with the environmentally-concerned Mountain rumbling forth its approval, how the chap was produced -- with the paper being "Acid-free, 25% cotton & 30% pcw recycled, produced with windpower". WINDPOWER! Yay-ness, indeed! And the cover being "Acid-free, chlorine-free, archival, 30% pcw recycled." We, at the mountain and including the mountain, are pleased.

HOW TO GET PUBLISHED

Well, more specifically: "How To Get Published, The Chatelaine Way." To wit, a publisher sends me something said publisher just published. I say -- GORGEOUS! This makes me wonder if you'd publish me! The publisher says, Sure!

See how easy it is?

It only took me a lifetime to get there.

More later. But dear you know who: Thank you and I'm thinking of you!

GARDENING & POETRY NEWS

which preambles with this conversation du jour:

The enchanting 5-year-old Cerise in a purr-fect princess dress: Eileen, where are the bad people in your dungeon?

Moi: Only good people are allowed at Galatea....

And then I served Cerise's parents (heh) a Greek dish I made for the first time: a summer "stew" of watermelon, French feta cheese and mint.

Mint -- that I picked from Moi's own garden! To wit:

THE CITY SLICKER'S HARVEST TALLY, to date

35 sprigs of parsley
3 yellow squashes
1 cherry
42 sprigs of basil
2 Santa Rosa plums
2 lemon cucumbers
10 sprigs of mint

*****

Cerise's Dad has a new poetry collection! Please to check out his version of Paradise!

IT'S ALL GREEK TO MOI!

"..she is arduously and long-sufferingly researching the poetry of wine"
--from the Chatelaine's bio for POST BLING BLING


I'll bite! So I did this test...and:

You scored as Erato. You are Erato. The muse of love poetry, you view the world through rose colored glasses. Appearance is very important to you, and you are considered to be the most beautiful of all nine muses. Erato 63% Terpischore 50% Calliope 50% Euterpe 44% Polyhymnia 44% Urania 44% Thalia 38% Clio 31% Melpomene 19% Which of the Greek Muses are you? created with QuizFarm.com

*****

Well, wine and whine overpowered the Greek Muse in Moi. When I moved to northern California, I had a choice: look as hot as I did while I was a New Yorker (hah) or risk lush-ious dissipation to enjoy the wine. Guess what Missy WinePoetics did?

What I do to suffer for my p!o!e!t!r!y...Sip. Early morning and she's already a-sippin'...!!!

RECOMMENDED

I join others (like here and here) in recommending Judith Butler's Giving An Account of Oneself (Fordham University Press, 2005). In fact, this ends up being the first epigraph in my 2007 book:

“Telling a story about oneself is not the same as giving an account of oneself.”

MOI LATEST TIC

Oh Dear Poet -- mayhap Moi am thinking about you?

My newest blog is POET TICS whose introduction explains:

A list as autobiography is one of my favorite tics... So this blog will present a daily record of poets who popped up in my thoughts....

If you see your name there, hopefully I didn't think of you because youse ticked me off. I just got a tic to do this....just to see what happens as I've done with other such lists before.

from the series "Poetry Economics: A Moronic Oxymoron"
WHY MUST POETRY BE TAXED WHEN IT'S A GIFT?

So I just filed and sent in my sales tax payment to the state of California for my activities as a poetry publisher/bookseller. A munificent sum of

$110.00

This is the kind of thing that's difficult to pigeonhole as either good news or bad news. Coughing up taxes is bad. But coughing up sales taxes means that one actually sold poetry books!

Still, revenues -- thus sales proceeds for the state of California -- are down. This is my third year of generating sales tax revenues:

2006: $110.00
2005: $254.00
2004: $2.00

2004! Two bucks. From a cyclical standpoint, poetry's ups and downs go pretty extreme....which may be apt as a poetry tax may as well mirror poetry's psychic toll.

Eh. Yawn. I'd rather talk about moi garden, to wit:

THE CITY SLICKER'S HARVEST TALLY, to date

35 sprigs of parsley
3 yellow squashes
1 cherry
42 sprigs of basil
2 Santa Rosa plums
2 lemon cucumbers...or is it cucumber lemons?

Now, if only I can figure out what to do with these baseball-shaped cucumbers besides juggling them...

FORM!AT M!O!I!

Grandpa Tom has an interesting comment on Moi's idea of "internal exclamation marks" (see prior post). Grandpa observes, "It makes for an interesting kind of partitioning."

Part!it!ion!ing....

Hmmm. Grandpa's notion res!on!ate!s...

P!U!R!R!R!

Got a new idea to write poems utilizing exclamation points (moi favorite punctuation marks) within bodies of words, as in this post's title. And, hee, got this idea partly from reading that SPD included PUNCTUATIONS among their latest list of Recommended Titles! Here's excerpt from their announcement--and thanks, SPD!

SPD RECOMMENDS: NEW TITLES for July 1—July 21, 2006
ORDERS: 1-800-869-7553

ORDERS@SPDBOOKS.ORG
FAX: 1-510-524-0852
WWW.SPDBOOKS.ORG
Try Electronic Ordering!  SPD is on PUBNET (SAN #106-6617)
Questions?  Contact Brent Cunningham at brent@spdbooks.org

**New Poetry from xPress(ed)**

THE SECRET LIVES OF PUNCTUATIONS, VOL. 1
by Tabios, Eileen R.
$14.95 / paper / pp.176
xPress(ed) 2006
ISBN: 952-99702-0-X
Poetry. Asian American Studies. Eileen R. Tabios' book revolves around the secret lives of those small gestures: punctuations. This volume reveals the resonant—and quirky—lives of the semi-colon, colon, ellipsis, parenthesis, strike-throughs, question mark, and the blank line. Also included are a decolonialism scholar's perspective on punctuations by Leny M. Strobel, as well as a visual art relationship with punctuations through the paintings of Eve Aschheim. Finally, the book offers postcard-art and a performance project entitled "The Secret Lives of Blank Lines" by the author who is also a conceptual/performance/visual artist. xPress(ed) is a publisher based in Finland.
http://www.spdbooks.org/details.asp?bookid=952997020X

NOT QUITE GOLD, BUT A BOOKISH WEEKEND

Spent the weekend exploring Grass Valley and Nevada City (former gold mining towns by the border of California and Nevada) because they supposedly contain these fabulous used bookstores. Depressing -- the book business continues to be depressed. What was available in these two towns can probably be captured by just a couple of bookstores in Berkeley. I'd say nearly all of the bookstores we hit are just going through remaining inventory without attempting to maintain a growing or at least vibrant selection. One bookseller said that Grass Valley lost its "book town" status long ago, however that is conferred, and for a reason: I could smell the staleness.

There were a couple of slightly amusing incidents -- for one, buying for $10 the first Arras chapbook put out by Brian Kim Stefans; who'da thunk I'd have to go all the way to Grass Valley to acquire The Analogy Guild by Tim Davis.

Then, at another bookstore, I expressed interest in H.D.'s Hermetic Definition but there was no price on it. The bookseller compared it to a slightly thicker poetry (though not poems) book, SELF-INTERVIEWS by James Dickey and said, based on thickness, should be about the same as that. I replied, Well, H.D.'s is thinner. Hence, I got H.D. for $3 vs Dickey's $5 sticker price.

Pathetic, indeed, is "poetry economics." Particularly when booksellers don't know what they're selling. Naturally, at all the used bookstores, the poetry section was the shelf(ves) as an aside...

Anyway, here are this weekend's addition to Galatea's library, including the Poetry Library:

POETRY:
NEVER WITHOUT ONE by Diane Ward

IRIS by Mark Jarman

THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO ALL THOSE MEN WHO BETRAYED ME AT ONE TIME OR ANOTHER IK HOPES THEY WILL FALL OFF THEIR MOTORCYCLES AND BREAK THEIR NECKS: THE MOTORCYCLE BETRAYAL POEMS by Diane Wakoski

WHO WHISPERED NEAR ME by Killarney Clark

IO AT NIGHT by Laurie Sheck

SELF-INTERVIEWS by James Dickey

HERMETIC DEFINITION by H.D.

STOLEN APPLES by Yevgeny Yevtushenko

BAPTISM OF DESIRE by Louise Erdrich (hardback and paperback)

THE CITY OF SATISFACTIONS by Daniel Hoffman

PROSE AND POEMS by Nick Joaquin

WHITE SAIL by Gilbert Sorrentino

COLLECTED POEMS 1948-1984 by Derek Walcott

UTOPIA TV STORE by Maxine Chernoff

THE ANALOGY GUILD by Tim Davis

THE CANTICLE OF THE ROSE: POEMS 1917-1949 by Edith Sitwell

THE SONG OF THE COLD by Edith Sitwell


NON-POETRY (in no particular order):
DOWN BELOW by Leonora Carrington

LEONARDO DA VINCI'S ADVICE TO ARTISTS

THE EXPLORING EXPEDITION TO THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS

WARFARE IN THE CLASSICAL WORLD, John Murray

WARFARE IN THE ANCIENT WORLD, Eds. John Hackett

HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, VOL. I to VI, Ed. John Bancroft

WARPATH AND BIVOUAC,John Finerty

A HISTORY OF SEA POWER, William Oliver Stevens 7 Allan Westcott

ORIGINS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, John G. Miller

THE EARLY GREEKS, R.J. Hopper

A HISTORY OF GREECE TO 322 B.C., N.G.B. Hammond

A HANDBOOK OF GREEK SCULPTURE, Ernest Arthur Gardner

MEDIEVAL WARFARE, Timothy Newark

FAMINE DIARY: JOURNEY TO A NEW WORLD, Gerald Keegan

LAKOTA NOON; THE INDIAN NARRATIVE OF CUSTER'S DEFEAT, Gregory F. Michno

FERDINAND AND ISABELLA, I & II, William Prescott

WHAT I SAW IN CALIFORNIA: BEING THE JOURNAL OF A TOUR 1846, 1847, Edwin Boyet

SCRAPS OF CALIFORNIA HISTORY, Simeon Ide

STANLEY IN AFRICA, Henry M. Stanley

LAND, SEA AND AIR, Mark Kerr

THE GREAT SEA WAR: THE STORY OF NAVAL ACTION IN WORLD WAR II, Eds E.B. Potter and Chester Nimitz

1916 SUPPLEMENT TO THE COMPILATION OF GENERAL ORDERS, CIRCULARS AND BULLETINS

FARE THEE WELL, APA JOURNAL!

'Tis a bit of a sniffle for me to have recently received what is the last issue of The Asian Pacific American Journal, which I'd helped edit for a number of years while I was still a New Yorker. The APA Journal is published by the Asian American Writers Workshop -- I agree with AAWW Director Quang Bao who calls The APA Journal "a tremendously successful experiment...totaling 24 issues with more than 300 poems and stories and works of art."

There is still a need for something like the APA Journal, but I can certainly understand its demise, relying as it did on contributions and volunteers, which is always too scarce for nonprofit literary and arts groups.

Anyway, somewhat leavening the sniffle is to discover this poem in its last issue -- I don't think it needs that parenthetical subtitle and I've seen it elsewhere without said subtitle; but Missy WinePoetics here certainly appreciates the humor of it -- thanks Barbara! (Is that "chateaux" a persona or real? Heee....)

Your Absence in Saint Helena
(Feasting at the Chateaux of Eileen Tabios)
by Barbara Jane Reyes


I am ascending this mountain at sunset, hearing rhythms of footfalls upon gravel paths and smoothed pebbles, dodging fallen pine cones, crunching dried grass, imagining the wholesomeness of wheat fields. Behind a hill of coniferous trees emerges the glassy surface of a once-hidden lake; different perspectives on the same valley of vineyards and haze from faraway forest fires. Long ago, lost lovers exchanged letters here, deposited with care in this decrepit tin box affixed to this gnarled oak with a single rusty nail. Above, swallows dive and soar through the stillest air, a sun-colored solitary hummingbird remains suspended, motionless except for wings effortlessly beating a million times per second. I am swirling the rain soaked earth and rose petals of a zinfandel in an immense wine goblet, instinctively reaching beside me, half expecting to find your belly and waistline warm against the flat of my palm, the bones of your slender wrist, a dragon tattoo’s sharp edge in the hollow of your left elbow. Tonight I understand how the sun can be infernal and blissful, how the fragrance of this valley can be dangerously deceptive.

THREE LIST UPDATES OF RECENT RELISHES

Is it coming to understand, viz Dante's Purgatorio, more about cavesoils that the earth is starting to hand over more bounty to my brown-thumbed palms? It's still a pathetic harvest list, but progress slowly, uh, progresses...

THE CITY SLICKER'S HARVEST TALLY, to date

27 sprigs of parsley
3 yellow squashes
1 cherry
42 sprigs of basil
2 Santa Rosa plums

And as always my update every other week or so of wines and books imbibed:

BOOKS:
PURGATORIO by Dante

IN THE HEART OF THE HEART OF ANOTHER COUNTRY, poetry/memoir by Etel Adnan

YES LOVE, poem by Dan Waber

NOTHING FICTIONAL BUT THE ACCURACY OF ARRANGEMENT (SHE, poems by Sawako Nakayasu

A LOOK AT THE DOOR WITH THE HINGES OFF, poems by Michael Heller

THE LISTENING LOST, poems by Mackenzie Carignan

PIECES OF THE SKY, poems by Greg Fuchs

MARBLE GODDESSES WITH TECHNICOLOR SKINS, poems by Corinne Robins

CENOTAPH, poems by Eric Pankey

ONCE I GAZED AT YOU IN WONDER, poems by Jan Heller Levi

COLLECTED POEMS by Edgar Bowers

FIRE IS FAVORABLE TO THE DREAMER, poems by Susan Terris

THE BEAUTY MAY SHE WALK: HIKING THE APPALACHIAN TRAIL AT 60, memoir by Leslie Marr

THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING, memoir by Joan Didion

YOU CAN GO HOME AGAIN, memoir by Gene Logsdon

MY CAT SPIT MCGEE, memoir by Willie Morris

THE WALMART EFFECT: HOW THE WORLD'S MOST POWERFUL COMPANY REALLY WORKS--AND HOW IT'S TRANSFORMING THE AMERICAN ECONOMY by Charles Fishman


WINES:
2002 Behrens & Hitchcock merlot Napa Valley
2003 Mondavi Reserve Fume Blanc
2003 Kistler chardonnay
2003 Dutch Henry chardonnay
1998 Turley zinfandel Napa Valley
2001 Chase zinfandel Hayne Vineyard
2002 Turley zinfandel Paso Robles, Ueberroth Vineyard
2002 Greenock Creek shiraz Apricot Blaze vineyard
1995 Mondavi reserve cabernet
1994 Ferrari Carrano "El Dorado"
1994 Ravenswood Woodrood Belloni zinfandel
2003 Raymond reserve chardonnay
2002 Jericho Canyon meritage
2003 Willi Schaufer Graacher Damprobet Spatlese
1994 Williams Selyem zinfandel Mendocino County
2000 Jones Family cabernet
1988 Rabaud-Promis sauterne

NOTA BENE DANTE

for noting Heaven (and Hell) are self-authored.

It's noticeable how many of those waging war on behalf of their gods often believe in god as a third-party authority, which could be to say, another way of avoiding self-responsibility.

***

An unexpected result of focusing on Dante's Divine Comedy is determining which area I would explore were I ever to re-pursue academic studies. To wit,

Religion.

This has nought to do with my own Faith (one don't need academia for that). It's more to do with history -- how human history has been so determined by religions. Including lack thereof...

Poetry can be about everything, including what one does not believe in.

Which is not to say my poetics is about stuff I don't believe in. I just don't want to shut my eyes against what I find difficult to tolerate -- I don't always succeed (sometimes, blindness), but this desire is one of Moi's poetics.

THE POIGNANT SYNCHRONICITY (PART II)

of Dante's Purgatorio leading me to consider theodicy while bombs and missiles fall on Lebanon and Israel.

I've also began reading Paradiso, where this below -- synchronistically, too, for a Chatelaine (keeper of keys) -- seemed apt to make its way into the manuscript for next year's book, which includes a consideration of mostly Purgatorio but thus also Paradiso:

"If the reckoning of mortals fails to turn
the lock to which your senses hold no key,
the arrows of wonder should not run you through"
-from Paradiso by Dante Alighieri, Trans. by John Ciardi

THE POIGNANT SYNCHRONICITY

of not having come to read Etel Adnan's In The Heart of the Heart of Another Country until today with missiles and bombs exploding in Lebanon and Israel.

I've long been curious about Adnan's poetry/memoir. It's a remarkable book, one of the few from contemporary writers that has made me wish, "Oh, I wish I wrote that!" (not, of course, in terms of content but its form, including how it handles its content, and specifically referring to the form of the book's overall (narrative) arc) and which is certainly one definitive answer to Bill Allegrezza's query on works that "will amaze, floor, shock, or impress".

Here are some lines that insisted I insert them in one of my own poems:

“my absence has been an exile from an exile”

“I am afraid of houses as tombs”

“…from neighbor to neighbor I shall cover the world”

“Half a bed makes a big house at night”

“There is always some cement on their bread”

“I drew flowers on a little box that I did not dare open, and I put it into the garbage.”

“Beirut is too busy to know the beauty of the sea”


And from Adnan's "To Be In A Time of War":

To say nothing, do nothing, mark time, to bend, to straighten up, to blame oneself, to stand, to go toward the window, to change one's mind in the process, to return to one's chair, to stand again, to go to the ballroom, to close the door, to then open the door, to go to the kitchen, to not eat or drink, to return to the table, to be bored, to take a few steps on the rug, to come close to the chimney, to look at it, to find it dull, to turn left to the main door, to come back to the room, to hesitate, to go on, just a bit, a trifle, to stop, to pull the right side of the curtain, then the other side, to stare at the wall.

And of course, the poem continues...mining the intersections between futility and resolve...

MERITAGE PRESS

Been helping out recently on the next two books to be realized by Meritage Press -- really honored that I'll be helping the full-length book-debuts of Tom Beckett and Bruna Mori. As with many other publishers, the list of Meritage Press' projects go on the last page of the books--and I can see that I'm much ahead of the one-project-a-year I'd planned when I began Meritage Press. One of these books is out-of-print, and another one soon will be, too! Well, Happy Fifth Anniversary to MP, moi teensy leetle press but with a beeeeeeg heart!

And, yep, I already have three, possibly four, books scheduled for 2007 -- so much poetry, so little time!

MERITAGE PRESS PROJECTS
(since 2001)

“Cold Water Flat” (2001). Signed and numbered etching by Archie Rand and John Yau. Limited edition of 37.

100 More Jokes From The Book of the Dead (2001). A monograph documenting a collaboration between Archie Rand and John Yau.

er, um (2002). A collection of ten poems by Garrett Caples and six drawings by Hu Xin. Limited edition of 75 copies. Signed and numbered by the poet.

Museum of Absences (2003). Poetry collection by Luis H. Francia. (Copublished with the University of the Philippines Press.)

Opera: Poems 1981-2001 (2003) by Barry Schwabsky.

Veins (2003). A poetry broadside by David Hess.

[ways] (2004). A poetry-art collaboration between Barry Schwabsky and Hong Seung-Hye. (Copublished with Artsonje Center, Seoul.)

The Oracular Sonnets (2004). An e-publication of a visual poetry collaboration between Mark Young and Jukka-Pekka Kervinen.

PINOY POETICS: A Collection of Autobiographical and Critical Essays on Filipino and Filipino-American Poetics (2004). Edited by Nick Carbo.

The Obedient Door (2005). Poems by Sean Tumoana Finney and drawings by Ward Schumaker.

THE FIRST HAY(NA)KU ANTHOLOGY (2005). Edited by Jean Vengua and Mark Young.

NOT EVEN DOGS (2006). Hay(na)ku Poems by Ernesto Priego.

Kali Blade (2006). Poems, prose and collaborations by Michelle Bautista.

Dérive (2006). A poetry-art collaboration by Bruna Mori and Matthew Kinney.

Unprotected Texts: Selected Poems (1978-2006) (2006). Poems by Tom Beckett.

SIGH -- OR, SAYANG -- POETICS

Unavoidable. Had company this weekend and we couldn't help but spend too much of the weekend glued to CNN's coverage of the Middle East. Thus, much empathy for Ernesto who says this:

The hay(na)ku seduced me into a constant translation of my reality into numbered stanzas; the form offered me a channel of exploration for my own relationship with languages, especially English and Spanish, but also French and even Latin. In other words, the hay(na)ku has represented for me, so far and since early 2005, the best manner of translating the hurting, fragmentary "essence" of my actual experience of reality.
...
The way I see the world, humankind is rapidly devolving into a barbaric, alienated, imbecile species. I still think that only art could save us from absolute catastrophe.

*****

I feel empathy, even as Dante's Purgatorio is a source for optimism...

ONE CAN ALWAYS HAVE MORE OTOLITHS!

Yes!! Made pesto successfully! And another parsleyed egg breakfast. To wit,

THE CITY SLICKER'S HARVEST TALLY, to date

10 sprigs of parsley
1 yellow squash
1 cherry
42 sprigs of basil
2 Santa Rosa plums

And as regards poetry besides what I eat, Congratulations to Mark Young for the latest from Otoliths -- this lovely project displays Mark's prowess as not just poet and editor but as publisher (yay for DIY-ers!):


FROM MARK'S PREEN-WORTHY ANNOUNCEMENT:
Drawn from the first issue of my e-zine Otoliths, & containing everything that was in the issue except for a piece by Dan Waber & Meghan Scott that I couldn't translate to print, the print on demand versions are now available.

Otoliths, issue one, part one, contains work by Michelle Greenblatt, kari edwards, Nico Vassilakis, Michael Farrell, Alex Gildzen, Michael P. Steven, Eileen Tabios, Tom Beckett, Nicholas Downing, Francis Raven, Andrew Lundwall, Bob Marcacci, Jukka-Pekka Kervinen, John M. Bennett, William Allegrezza, Martin Edmond, Ernesto Priego, Laurie Duggan, Jordan Stempleman, Irving Weiss, Jeff Harrison, Lars Palm, PR Primeau, Richard Lopez, Jack Kimball, CAConrad, Gregory Vincent St Thomasino, Thomas Fink, Jean Vengua &Dion Farquhar. It's the b&w part.

Otoliths, issue one, part two, contains work by Sheila E. Murphy, Daniel f Bradley, Reed Altemus, Ray Craig, harry k stammer, Michael Rothenberg, Marko J. Niemi, David-Baptiste Chirot, Jukka-Pekka Kervinen & John M. Bennett, Donna Kuhn, Geof Huth &Dan Waber (with Meghan Scott). It's in full colour.

Also available are the two chapbooks that came out of the issue: Jean Vengua's The Aching Vicinities, which, amazingly, is the first collection by this wonderful poet to be published. I am proud to be able to associated with this long-overdue "debut"; & Ray Craig's inferred from. two identical distances., which, I think, might also be a first collection (&, if so, also long overdue) & which contains drawings & poems, including some that Ray posted to the comments boxes of Otoliths after the issue went live, beautiful stuff that illustrates why I like this guy's work so much.

I'm not much given to preening, but this is definitely an occasion for it. I am proud of Otoliths, & these print editions are the perfect wrapping up of what I consider to be the first step of a wonderful adventure.

from "Poetry Economics: A Moronic Oxymoron"
CARBON NEUTRAL, ANYONE?

I haven't yet belabored this point. Another reason for Meritage Press to use POD is at the behest of the mountain(s) and helping out the trees. It's sad sighting to see mounds of poetry books defining "permanent inventory." And viz Pierre Joris, this is a link to how the publishing industry copes with the hurting planet.

THE DAY IS LOOKING GOOD

I had waaaay over-parsleyed eggs for breakfast this morning, and the universe was at balance. Why, you ask? But of course you ask if you're here! And I reply, Coz said parsley was HARVESTED from moi garden!!!!!! Slowly but surely, dem cave soils are revealing their bounty!!!! The latest:

THE CITY SLICKER'S HARVEST TALLY, to date

5 sprigs of parsley
1 yellow squash
1 cherry
18 sprigs of basil
2 Santa Rosa plums

And the Chatty One coos at the still recalcitrant plants: onions, tomatoes, eggplants, melon, squash, mint, lemons, limes, peaches, pluotes, figs...Come to Mama...!

But the basil keeps a-springin' which is to say, Thanks to Leny (as great a cook as she is a poet and scholar!) who sends off this easy -- Moi needs 'em EASY! -- recipe to the One Whose Attempts To Cook Often Result in Medical Emergencies (see 6/25 post):

Pesto -- mix in a blender: one or two cloves of garlic, basil leaves (lots!), pine nuts or walnuts, olive oil, salt and pepper.

Last but not least, purring over SPD's recent order to restock inventory of Pinoy Poetics -- it's a unique, useful, educational and inspiring book and I'm glad the word is gettin' out!

SINCE NAPA SUMMERS ARE SO HOT, I'M IN DANTE'S HELL WHICH DOES FREEZE OVER

An Oxford scholar on William Blake who often has to consider Dante viz Blake is teaching 3 sessions at the local college, thus allowing me to get immersed in Dante's Purgatorio and Inferno this month. (I'd share the prof's name but it's on papers left in the car in the courtyard and I'd rather not go meet the mountain lion at this hour.) A wonderful synchronicity to have the chance to focus on Dante since the Purgatorio also rears its icey hell of a head in the manuscript I'm preparing to be next year's book.

And from that course's hand-out this afternoon, and of relevance to Moi's blog:

"To the extent that finite creatures are 'transparent' to pure form or Intellect, they are not other than the self-subsistent reality within which they arise (the Empyrean) and are not bound by space-time. Such creatures are immaterial and intelligent, nearly unqualified existence: they are angels."
--Christian Moevs, The Metaphysics of Dante's Comedy

It's fitting, as well, to be studying the Purgatorio while in wine country. Here, we know of "cave soils" -- as what sprung up to form Purgatorio's boulders when the devil plunged into earth...Sip. Tonight, the very local 2001 Chase zinfandel Hayne Vineyard.

A FORM OF DISRUPTING...FORM

is partly what my 2007 book addresses. Which is to say, some of the poems are blog posts partly because, in this case, the blog post -- by a persona, or is it? -- disrupts conventional autobiographical writing. In so doing, it's performance poetry.

Sincerely,
The Chatty's Navel

WHY I LIKE TO LINK

First, Gregory Vincent St. Thomasino sez:

On the Hay(na)ku Form

The first thing about the hay(na)ku is, you can't write just one. Once you begin to get the hang of it you just wanna keep going, finding and then refining your technique. The second thing (I find) is the hay(na)ku is conducive to hyperbole. Now, normally, to pile up hyperbole is to risk committing the ridiculous, or else (and here's another term for you all) resulting in what I call "squelch." "Squelch poetry." Squelch is just what you think it is, just what the word implies, or, one poet's noise is another poet's communication. . . . Unlike the Japanese short forms, the hay(na)ku is a one-two punch.

And then some of Gregory's hay(na)ku -- pomo hay(na)ku! -- here!

Secondly, Tom Beckett says that through PUNCTUATIONS I've progressed from "start[l]ingly regular brilliance to everyday genius." Thank you, Tom. I hope the MacArthur Foundation hears ya. I can use one of their "Genius Grants" of half a million bucks as I'm hoping soon to embark on clearing 4 acres for vineyards. Missy WinePoetics needs must be authentic and this just continues what she needs to do for her art....and in case some of you had been thinking all along that I was just making things up, did you see the recent NYTimes article on British artist Anya Gallaccio? Prior work includes once arranging "the leaves and petals of 10,000 red roses into a fragrant, Rothko-like Color Field abstraction that gradually shriveled into potpourri on the gallery floor [and installing] a 32-ton block of ice in the boiler room of a disused London pumping station, leaving it to melt away over the course of two months."

So Gallaccio's latest project, "After the Gold Rush," in a collaboration with the winemaker Zelma Long, will culminate next summer in 400 half-cases of six different types of zinfandel. It's apparently a project that deals with place and lo and behold, during the process Gallacio discovers what I've long been blathering about as a blogger (not to mention essayed in BAY POETICS): "the practicalities and subtleties of the process of making wine [is] a practice that turns out to have a surprising amount in common with making art."

So really, MacArthur Foundation should grant that I'm a genius. I'm sure the check is in the mail.

Thirdly but not leastly, purring over what Allen Bramhall says about Galatea Resurrects: here. I like how Allen phrases "instigating the critical side" -- I like the idea of instigations and not just critiques.

AUGUSTINE AND HELLER

Tomatoes, mozzarella and basil drizzled with olive oil and tad of red vinegar is a great dish. But by the time the summer is over, I expect to be sick of it.

I keep serving that dish, you see, because it allows me to utilize the only thing I'm having great luck in *harvesting* this season: basil. To wit, whenever I get anything from that begrudging hellhole that passes off as my garden, it's so rare I need to belabor it--so, here's moi latest

THE CITY SLICKER'S HARVEST TALLY, to date

1 yellow squash
1 cherry
18 sprigs of basil
2 Santa Rosa plums

Here's a list of plants that simply refuse to give up anything for Moi: tomatoes, eggplants, melon, squash, mint, parsley, ... I could go on but this paragraph is irritating me.

Anyway, cocktail hour this afternoon will be with visiting poets Jane Augustine and Michael Heller. No doubt, I'll serve them some basil, bronzed. And they best be grateful! Okay...must get to that bronzin'...!

Which is all a long, summery way to get to say, if you don't know the works of these two poets....this is a recommendation to explore...!

A VERITABLE CHAP PARADISE!

One of the pleasures of editing Galatea Resurrects is seeing all these fabuloso books and chaps land as review copies in my In Box. It all helps me achieve my goal of reading every single poem ever written (whether or not I'll ever say anything publicly about said poems).

Anyway, with all that traffic into my In Box, it made me realize just what a stupendously LOVELY and BRILLIANT project Susana Gardner helped manage through the Dusie chap collective efforts. I've never seen so many lovely chaps go perch among moi papers -- in fact, without intending to, I even ended up reviewing one for the next issue of Galatea Resurrects.

Anyway, if you wish to see what lovely Dusie chaps -- and other publications -- are looking for engagements, please check here for the list of GR's review copies!

THE INVISIBILITY OF DIVERSITY

Of significance -- and usefulness -- is the ability to believe what you do not want to believe.

Most of the days I spent by my father's bedside was underlied with the belief he would get better. He had cancer, he hadn't eaten in weeks, and still no recognition from me of the process of dying.

The recently-discovered GOSPEL OF JUDAS resonates, not just because I was raised a Christian. It resonates because it debunks a lie. Such a strongly-believed lie that "Judas" became synonymous with "traitor."

What now should Judas stand for? The issue is not of poetic justic here.

Certainly, in not just religion do we see demonization as a strategy to shut out others. When Judas' Gospel was discovered, Gnostic scholar -- and one of the most brilliant minds I've had the privilege of witnessing -- Elaine Pagels, noted, "These discoveries are exploding the myth of a monolithic religion, and demonstrating how diverse — and fascinating — the early Christian movement really was."

Diversity is simply what is, separate from what people choose to see, want to believe.

MAGICAL THINKING

Just finished THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING, Joan Didion's memoir on the death and sickness of, respectively, her husband John Gregory Dunne and their daughter Quintana. It's an interesting comparison (for my navel) to consider Didion's book with the manuscript I just finished (see prior post) about the death of my father (still only three months ago).

Because my form is poetry, I of course use the poetic "I" who, for me, is not I's negation but the defining of I as All. (Both are equally impossible but this is just the formal aspect, yah?) From my first poem "What Can A Daughter Say?"--

What is a number? "I" is rarely "1".


Or, hmm, let me share a longer excerpt:

To reassess exile's historical role--
To acknowledge exile as savior--
To not diminish "exile" as mere manifestation of loss--

And Jesus said, according to Judas, "Why have you gone into hiding?"

O Heart, my father is not Elie Hobeika who killed 1,700 Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps. And "an unknown number of others" during the Lebanese Civil War.

O Heart, my father is not Enver Hoxha of Albania whose victims cannot be counted reliably by the living, but can be estimated as "in the thousands."

What is a number? "I" is rarely "1".

She says about being "a child of a dictator"--"I don't remember."


I think I could have taken a more direct memoir route of writing about my father's death. At first, I hesitated because I thought that any poet's life isn't that interesting to others. But that's not right -- it could be if the work is written well and interestingly enough. And so it became a technical strategy: the book about my father's death became written from the I of Many because such would deepen further...Grief.

The radical swing between despair and (if not joy at least) optimism is more authentic.

Thus also making its ending, "[GRIN]" even more of a ... relief.

***

Didion entitled her book, by the way, because her "magical thinking" was one of desperately wanting her husband back. I know how she feels--more than one is referenced by:

She wanted him back.

THE LIGHT THAT LEFT HIS BODY ENTERED THINE EYES

through a poem. A poem I just completed. A month of research. A day of writing. A six-part poem. And so the first draft for my 2007 book is done. This poem begins that book. This poem is entitled "What Can A Daughter Say" and begins. after an epigraph by Stanley Kunitz, as:

"O Heart, this is a dream I had, or not a dream.
Lovingly, lovingly, I wept, but my tears did not rhyme."
-from "Poem" by Stanley Kunitz

I.
O Heart, my father was not Idi Amin who killed 100,000 to half-a-million in Uganda.

O Heart, my father was not Ion Antonescu who killed 300,000 Romanian Jews and half-a-million Romanian soldiers.

*****end of excerpt*****

Well, you can't tell from the above but though this is the most overtly political book I will have written, it still, "at the end of the day", literally ends with a

[GRIN]

I may risk it all in poker, but I never play to lose.

THREE LISTS OF RELISHES

The first being the bathetic if not pathetic list:

THIS SEASON'S CITY SLICKER'S HARVEST TALLY TO DATE:
1 yellow squash
1 cherry
8 sprigs of basil
2 Santa Rosa plums

And moi recently read and imbibed lists:

PUBLICATIONS:
MOSAIC NOTES, poems by Allen Bramhall

THE COLLECTED POEMS by Stanley Kunitz

FIELD STONE, poems by Catherine Kasper

INSECT COUNTRY (A), poems by Sawako Nakayasu

ALWAYS A RECKONING, poems by Jimmy Carter

HEALING HEART, poems by Gloria Hull

LATE SETTINGS, poems by James Merrill

MY PART OF THE RIVER, memoir by Grace Foakes

THE MILLIONAIRE NEXT DOOR: THE SURPRISING SECRETS OF AMERICA'S WEALTH, study by Thomas J. Stanley and William D. Danto


WINES:
1989 Rabaja Barbaresco
1970 BVPR
1997 Peter Michael Le Moulin Rouge pinot noir
1986 Penfold Cab Sauvignon Bin 707
2001 Dutch Henry cabernet private reserve
2002 Kistler Sonoma Valley chardonnay
1989 CNP Bosquet des Papes
2003 CNP Domaine Pegau Cuvee Da Capo
1971 Ch. Clos Haut-Peyraguey sauterne
2004 Mark Auberd The Quarry chardonnay
1997 Dalle Valle cabernet
1997 Napa Nook
2003 Dutch Henry chardonnay
2002 Dutch Henry Argos
2005 Dutch Henry rose

"I LOVE ARTISTS"

See, I know why Mei-mei Berssenbrugge titled her Selected Poems collection I LOVE ARTISTS. To wit, Galatea welcomes the latest additions to its walls -- several fabulous drawings by poet-painter Brian Lucas, including "Garden Below":



Be sure to check out Brian's painterly blog NOT ABOVE, NOT BELOW where you'll also see more fabulous images, including other forthcoming additions to Galatea's walls:

Black Mirror--ink and watercolor on paper (19 x 28cm)
Black Mirror IV--same as above
Tower-pencil on paper (25 x 35cm)
Filament--same as above

I LOVE ART!

THE MOUNTAIN SAYS, NO NEED TO COME TO ME -- JUST PROTECT THE ENVIRONMENT

Had an early July 4 barbecue yesterday -- I think I'm attending five this weekend, plus a pancake breakfast (yum!) in an hour. Anyway, 'twas a gas to be able to "harvest" basil from the garden for one of the dishes I served (tomato, basil and mozzarella in olive oil). So, here is my new update on two seasons' worth from

THE CITY SLICKER'S HARVEST TALLY

8 cherry tomatoes

1 yellow squash

1 cherry

8 sprigs of basil

Belay that laughter, Peep. I'ma gonna squeeze munificent bounties from that space labeled "vegetable garden" yet!

Speaking of how we should appreciate nature's bounty, I finally saw "An Inconvenient Truth". At one point, it made me glad Al Gore lost the presidency as this refocused him on environmental work -- nature needs more attention. Check this out -- we already have the science available to be able to protect the environment without resulting in economic losses (this is the false binary always raised by those protecting big oil). What we lack is political will -- in California, for instance, (and speaking as a former alternative energy banker), it's possible to install wind power facilities that could take care of a third (a third!) of the state's energy needs. We also should be moving people towards hydbrid cars -- politicos should offer the same tax incentives that, for example, allowed us to install a solar field here on Galatea's mountain.

Anyway, we should educate ourselves on this -- Global Warming is not a problem over which individuals can make no impact -- go HERE for starters.

SUPREME COURT PROTECTS MOI FROM BOOGERS

It does, it does! For succinct report on my recent victory, go here.

CUBIST, NOT LINEAR

I thank MIDWEST BOOK REVIEW for having recently reviewed The Secret Lives of Punctuations, Vol. I. Here is text of review because ... it gives Moi a winning poker hand:

from Midwest Book Review
The Secret Lives of Punctuations, Vol. I

Eileen R. Tabios has too many qualifications to mention them all here. Notably, ten books of personal poetry have been published to date; she has edited or co-edited five books of poetry, fiction, and essays; her internationally recognized blog can be found at http://chatelaine-poet.blogspot.com; and she oversees Meritage Press, a multidisciplinary arts and literary project. In this book she's applied her skills as poet, conceptual/performance and visual artist as she contemplates punctuation. Her thought processes here are cubist, not linear. That is, the song is what we think it to be and reality is a concept as varied as the beholders.

Tabios follows a less-traveled path here as she investigates the effects of semi-colons, colons, parentheses, ellipses, strikethroughs, and question marks on words and readers. She brings punctuation marks out of near-invisibility by bringing them into the foreground. Like Eve Ascheim's powerful, understated cover art, Tabios' work here is a mirror that both hides and reveals.

Think about the following examples. Open your mind and let your imagination refocus.

; The Second Last Chance

; rough skin a map
; allowing entry for what a lover represents
; the glue of ifs
; on edge through a silver lash
; overhearing the language shared by a toddler and a stuffed animal
; unfurling an antique wedding veil
; bone


: Wild

: the all-consuming business of prehistoric histrionics
: refusing to believe math is synonymous with description
: place becomes person
: sodden tissue balled up into a small, dead bird
: fleshing out the ghosts of unicorns
: a complexion formed from miles and miles of bad and bad roads
: "dreadlocks"

In a section titled "The Masvikiru Quatrains," Tabios addresses implied meanings and forms. These revelations of the mind's eye were inspired by Finnish poet and composer Jukka-Pekka Kervinen's computer generated soundscapes, based more on word sound than meaning. In these quatrains comprised of seemingly unrelated words, the blending and cadence of sound is meaningful when read aloud. Incredibly, The Masvikiru Quatrains are ekphrasis, inspired by studying Shona sculpture.

Ms. Tabios' work in this book is scholarly in nature, yet enlightening and understandable once the reader's mind is opened to it. At the end of the book is a space for each reader to write their thoughts in the form of a blurb as feedback for the author and publisher. You've just read mine.

review by Laurel Johnson

WANNA TASTE MOI CHERRY?

Get your mind out of the gutter...but before I explain what I mean, I am PLEASED to announce that all of Galatea Resurrects' linkies are back and fully operative:

Here is the primary link: GALATEA RESURRECTS through which you can go on to read the first two issues of poetry reviews and engagements.

And I've also just updated the Submission/Review information to reflect recently-received review copies over at Galatea's Purse.

So...all this makes me so pleased I helped bake a CHERRY PIE. WANNA SLICE?

WOOF! WOOF! WAIT A MINUTE!

Wait a minute, Achilles and Gabriela bark! So far, when Blogger restored the other blogs, they seemed only to have restored their first pages (hence, not Archives). It's good enough for some blogs but not all.

Well, shitskie again. Moi will have to return to Blogger Help -- copy this link, Peeps! Nevuh know when you'll need to use it!

I like this quote, though, from Ernesto whilst he was mourning moi temporary blog-disappearance:

"Soon the only thing left will be for us to forget the specious distinction between the propagation of images or waves and that of objects or bodies, since from now on all duration will be measured in intensity".
--Paul Virilio, The Aesthetics of Disappearance, (74)

It does touch on moi poetics. As in, a goal of poems that beam forth intense-ly. The radiance of such poems, whether by moiself or others, often helps the Blind Chatelaine ... see.