Formerly "The Blind Chatelaine's Poker Poetics". Performed from Galatea's mountain -- where nature, art, poetry and wine converge with much love -- she now goes through her keychain as if it were a rosary, unlocking doors for you. Because if Rimbaud said "I is Another," the Chatelaine shares, "Moi am all about Toi."
So I'm flying south for the, uh, spring! Should be back in blogland in mid-April or so, when this blog will present a new face. Until then, the grinning mugs of your Chatelaine Plus Dawg from their early days in blogland:
Labels: Conjuration, Happy as a cop with a donut, What I Do To Amuse Moiself
posted by na at 12:00 AM
If only because it's an honor to serve on the Board of Kelsey Street Press, Moi should note that said Kelsey Street Press now has a BLOG!
posted by na at 1:49 PM
People who think artists shouldn't reveal that much of their personal lives confuse the process for result. There is no single right process. Some attempts at art succeed, and some don't, but the former doesn't validate a particular path for should-rule-making, just as the latter doesn't mean one should never go down a certain path.
Labels: Poetic Forms, Poetics, Visual Art
posted by na at 7:23 AM
is that for part of my South American trip, Moi own Gura Michelle will accompany me....I couldn't have anticipated that! There are certain people in this life whose presence just makes the living flow easier. For Moi, that'd be Michelle. I can't think of a better bodyguard. She may be lovely but she wields a BIG STICK.
It's always that hand that you're not paying attention to, that makes everything happen. In this school we concern ourselves with the masculine and feminine sides. In this case my dominant hand the right one, is the masculine energy, where I hold the weapon, my power hand as it were. The left hand is the feminine hand, the ones that guides, directs, manipulates and counter balances the right hand.
But in this particular instance, the knife, what we consider a feminine weapon at least in the way we use it, is in my right hand. The Female Knife, what we call what I'm doing, isn't the Psycho-movie slashing or jabbing that you see in movies which is more masculine. The Female Knife is hidden. And in this case, it is hidden and protected by the left hand.
And here's the part that I think will be the most fascinating aspect...Tuhan described these hands once not has male and female, but as mother and son. The Son being the knife hand is being fed and protected by the Mother, the empty hand. If you watch closely, it's this open hand that makes contact and feeds the baddie to the knife hand. You see this when my hands are relatively close together when engaging the baddie. The Mother feeds her Son. While not engaged with the baddie, the Mother protects the Son by hiding him. So you see the knife disappear behind my left arm often. Then at times, the Mother allows the Son to venture off on his own but always nearby. You can see this when my knife hand shoots to the baddie's throat and my other hand is left behind clearing the baddie's punching hand. The Mother still tries to ensure the Son's safety even when she allows him to venture off. After all, can't have a cloistered Son, especially when baddies are around. The Knife must do what the Knife was meant to do and the open hand must encourage and allow that for it to be effective.
Labels: Conjuration, What I Do To Amuse Moiself
posted by na at 10:50 PM
I leave for South America this Saturday morning (yes dear goats and peeps, there's a reason why I can't identify which country). I'll probably be out of the country for a month. Perhaps some sporadic email access, but no guarantee.
Labels: Conjuration
posted by na at 5:47 PM
Woot! For obvious reasons! Galatea Resurrects' Ninth Issue is HERE! And a record number of new reviews it is at 65 poetry publications covered!
Labels: Galatea Resurrects
posted by na at 12:15 PM
Just trying to get in some work in the future THE CHAINED HAY(NA)KU PROJECT anthology before I leave U.S. terroir for a month or so....hoping to send out responses soon to those who submitted works. And I just realized that it looks like participants will number 72 poets and visual artists from around the world.
Labels: Hay(na)ku
posted by na at 9:30 AM
Interesting to see Poetry discussed in the context of "market forces", to wit:
Labels: Poetic Forms, Poetry Economics: A Moronic Oxymoron, Politics
posted by na at 7:12 PM
Today, I worked on ensuring that a bookstore an ocean away will come through on paying the amount owed on 60 books it had ordered direct from moi Meritage Press. (So much for avoiding a distributor's cut by avoiding a ... distributor.) I think the financial situation stabilized -- which is good because if the bookstore had reneged, that would have eliminated one book from Meritage Press' publishing schedule this year.
posted by na at 10:50 PM
As I was just telling one of Galatea Resurrects' reviewers this morning, I just sit moi fat (but enchanting) ass here on a mountain and all these lovely Mohammads keep arriving...
Labels: Galatea Resurrects
posted by na at 9:29 AM
A poet-engineer wrote a review for the next issue of Galatea Resurrects. Consequently, said engineer invokes Gaussian white noise as well as the Shannon-Weaver communications model. I love it. Poetry can be about ... everything.
Labels: Galatea Resurrects, Poetics, What I Do To Amuse Moiself
posted by na at 12:01 PM
Thomas Fink just sent me a copy of his newest, clarity and other poems (Marsh Hawk Press, 2008). And as a preventative to having the book bent during snailmail, Tom had inserted his book between two pieces of cardboard. Thing is, Tom is a painter as well as a poet and one of the cardboard pieces must have come from his painting studio as it bore the stray debris from various brushstrokes.
Labels: Poetic Forms, Poetics
posted by na at 12:01 AM
Within the past five days, two of my Meritage Press authors have shared that they've received tenure at their respective universities. These are authors whose first and second books, respectively, Meritage Press recently released. Connect the dots, ye goats. Preen.
Labels: MERITAGE PRESS, What I Do To Amuse Moiself
posted by na at 9:32 AM
I studied Spanish for eight years. But I'm not one of those to whom second languages come easy. Though I kept studying Spanish, I never practiced it beyond the classroom entonces mi vocabulario es basically nada. In fact, as an undergrad at Barnard College, I felt myself hit the learning-ceiling on Spanish after one year of studying it there. That was a problem because one had to have two years of a foreign language to graduate. So, I switched to Swahili.
posted by na at 11:08 PM
Pleased to be in the Anti-War Papers section of the new BIG BRIDGE! Here are the deets:
Labels: Poem Appearances
posted by na at 5:50 PM
