WHAT IT'S LIKE (OR CAN BE LIKE) TO BE A POET

I was all day in San Francisco yesterday, moving from one meeting or session to another that involved me having to sign off on mucho legalese documents. And whilst in the elevator with the hubby in my lawyer's building downtown, we ended up sharing it with another lawyer. The hubby re-introduced us to each other, reminding me (since he knows moi memory is a sieve) that we'd met once before. The lawyer said, "Oh yes. I've read your poetry." Now. A wise poet -- and I like to think on matters like this I'm unlike moiself and am actually wise -- never expects to float through the world and bump into strangers who've read her poems. Never. So, to the lawyer's statement, I replied as I often do when I'm stumped. With humor. To wit, I replied, "I'm sorry" and we all laughed briefly as the lawyer (diplomatically if nothing else) paid a compliment to my poems (a compliment I realized was a compliment but didn't actually hear in its specifics because I was hearing instead the buzz of bemusement at being confronted this way). And because on matters like these I am wise, I've been reflecting on the incident. And, first, I am of course grateful to have had the incident -- because it's pretty rare when, as I've blatantly implied, poets meet a total or near-total stranger who's read their poems. And because I'm wise, I'm grateful. Then, being the perverse creature that Moi am, I become irritated. I'm irritated that I have to be grateful for moments like these. Because of course it hearkens the larger issue of how little poetry plays in many people's everyday lives ... such as that a poet can feel grateful for such incidents as yesterday's. Then I get irritated even more that I don't possess the grace to simply feel, Thank you, and then move on without being irritated. Then I get irritated at being reminded yet again of how I often am graceless. Then I get irritated at being irritated over what was an undeniably positive moment. And, now I'm sitting here berating myself -- mentally screaming at moiself, Don't you dare get irritated that the incident occurred, that someone actually read and liked your poems! Don't you dare! Sometimes, it's so ... so ... well, there's no other way to put it: so bloody irritating to be a poet!

ATTENTION BABAYLANS!

You know, I always joke that the hubby married the first Filipina who can't cook. That's not quite true, of course. My Mom was the first, which explains why I'm the second Filipina who can't cook. (Filipinas, in case you don't get it, are often fabulous in the kitchen...well, and elsewhere of course!)

Coming to the U.S. forced my Mom to learn to cook, but it was too late for her to mentor me in the kitchen. Now, this week Mom visited my brother in Los Angeles. This meant I had to cook dinner for Michael -- for those who've asked me what's been most difficult about being a parent, I can straight up tell you that it's been having to become responsible for feeding (in hopefully a responsible way) another human being.

Anyway, from sheer embarrassment I won't share what I fed the hijo tonight. But his reaction was something like this (from another meal -- I get this reaction a lot):



Fortunately for Moi, I will be presenting and charming peeps at THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL BABAYLAN CONFERENCE taking place April 17-18 at Sonoma State University. Which is to say, I will be meeting a lot of you Pinays. So I have an offer for you:

BRING ME AN EASY-TO-MAKE RECIPE

and I'll give you comp copy of a book. Actually, it's not just an offer. It's an order--kapisch?

C'mon Babaylan--have pity on Moi.

***

Just looked at Michael's pic above. Sigh: I feel sorry for him and I hope he'll survive me, or at least my cooking. Here he is in a happier context with my first son Achilles, who actually loves my cooking! No one can mix canned dog food and kibble with such flair as I do!

"IT WAS NOT RAINING ANYMORE"

In his English class this week, Michael and his classmates were taught how to write a narrative essay. And, specifically, an essay about what happened during the recent storms that passed our way. Well, imagine moi surprise when he wrote what also ended up being a reading report about the Litquake reading and his first attendance of a poetry reading! To wit, Michael's narrative:

Last week when it rained, my family and I traveled to San Francisco. My mom was due to give a poetry reading.

At first, the traffic was bad because of the rain. So we took many streets before we arrived at the apartment. Then we changed our clothes in preparation for my mom's and other people's literary readings.

Then we went to dinner. I ate chicken, shrimp and French Fries. Then we went to the gallery for my mom's performance. The gallery showed the paintings of many artists. The ones I liked had many colors.

After that tour of the gallery, the poets began to read their poems. My mom was one of four [actually six] readers, and she read last. I liked her poems about flamenco.

Once it was over, my family and I said goodby to the persons. Then we went home. It was not raining anymore.

The constraints on his essay were that each new paragraph would begin with phrases that facilitate narrative: "At first," "Then," "After that", and "Once it was over". It's a giggle, ain't it!

And I most definitely recommend where Michael "ate chicken, shrimp and French Fries" -- the Peruvian restaurant LIMON deservedly famous for its superb cuisine!

*****

Unfortunately, in other academic (pun intended) matters, I recently was not as helpful. First quarter grades are being sent out this week and I apparently cost Michael an "A" in PE. What happened was he came down with a slight cold a few weeks back. So I'd suggested to him that day that he ask to be excused from physical activity in PE so that he can preserve his energies for soccer practice later that day; after all, I figured he'd get physical exercise from soccer.

Well, the PE teacher said (aptly, with hindsight) that if he wasn't able to do PE, he shouldn't be able to do soccer practice either. At the time, I thought the PE teacher was just defending his/her turf and thought it silly. So I brought Michael to soccer practice anyway (and the PE teacher saw him there!).

Now, in the real world, that's the kind of choice that one makes when one's trying to be effective -- and perhaps in the real world one would say my call was the right call. After all, his team would come to win a soccer championship and those victories are possible only because his team practiced, practiced, and practiced. But, I was wrong. I didn't think about the implications of discounting school, or of discounting a teacher's instructions.

So chalk it up to newbie-parenting. For the quarter, his PE grade fell from A to a B+ ... all because Mom was not as smart as she thought. Sheesh: I thought having to cook every day was hard...

NEWBIE PARENTING

Okay, I guess it was just ALL TOO MUCH to discuss metaphorical algebraic connections in poetry and then have Michael be able to regurgitate, I mean, explain all that meta stuff to his 7th grade class -- particularly as he is just five months into learning English and mi muy malo espanol was not up to snuff. So, instead of doing a math poster on his poet-Mom viz FOOTNOTES TO ALGEBRA, he did a math poster instead on his lawyer-dad. I'm not bitter of course (even as the hubby grins): after all, the required math example of billing x number of hours and then multiplying it by a billable rate is merely multiplication (that is soooo second grade)...I was going off into algebraic horizons, y'all. Sigh. Anyway, here is Michael with his math poster absent my poetry:



And continuing on to newbie parenting, do you see how he looks like a marine? Yep, Mommy Moi screwed up. He was so handsome, but when I took my boy to the barbershop, I yelled out with my funky sense of humor: "Take it off! Take it all off!"

This is to the same barber who'd previously given Michael a stylish haircut, and which I assumed he would know to replicate. But the dude took me literally...and unfortunately, it wasn't until he had done half of Michael's head that I realized he really was taking it all off with a razor! Just picture me with my jaw dropped to the barbershop floor as I realized his/my mistake...but also knowing there was no way I could correct it as it was too late. So I had to sit there all wide-eyed as he continued to scalp my son who, by then, was mewling out, "Me no like. Me no like" about his inadvertent new hairstyle!

Afterwards, I lied like the shyster Moi am and informed Michael that this was a one-time scalping and which I did only to allow all of his new hair to grow out healthier in the future.

But, btw, the haircut occurred just in time for today's "Picture Day" (when the school takes official school pictures) so that my mistake will be memorialized in this year's school photos which also will be replicated in the future yearbook. As the hubby drily said when he saw Michael's haircut:

"Nice work, Eileen..."

Well, at least his new braces aren't my fault.

*****

P.S. But this morning, Michael asked for a poetry book of mine....so at least maybe the earlier discussions about FOOTNOTES TO ALGEBRA were not for naught if it got him more interested in Mom's poetry. That's something, right, she asks herself as her wingtip reaches towards the computer screen to caress the almost-bald scalp of her son....her still handsome son...

COMO SE DICE "OY VEY" EN ESPANOL?

Apparently, the would-be Spanish-speaking Moi called someone a "dirty body" today when she meant to say "kitchen."

Apparently numero dos, the culprit was Moi's faux Italiano accent.

*****

Okay--some legit bizness. I'm still swamped, so am still willing to take Galatea Resurrects reviews through to Wednesday since it's not like I can pay attention to closing out the issue until at least that time. Comprendez, ye dirty bodies?

MOI'S BRILLIANT MASK SLIPS

First and foremost, I thank Allen Gaborro for his (too-generous) review of The Light Sang As It Left Your Eyes in the latest issue of Philippine News. Really -- thank you. ENTIRE REVIEW HERE -- and I do suggest you read it since it's quite flattering to Moi.

The problem is that I learned of his review through a Listserve email that I first read on my Iphone, as I was seated at the dining table entertaining some out-of-town guests, Fred and Lisa, who inflicted themselves on me and Galatea this weekend. So I thought, as the conversation was flagging anyway as it often does with Fred, I'd read the review out loud to the company even as I read it for the first time. Well, the review begins:

I once had a college classmate who was so exceptional as a student that our professor exclaimed, with tongue-in-cheek, that she could submit a paper with absolutely nothing written on it and still receive the highest grade.

Okay....undoubtedly, it was the fact that I was on my fourth bottle of wine but I just couldn't understand this opening sentence. I kept reading and re-reading it out loud, even as I kept asking our friends, "But what does it mean...?"

Finally, my long-suffering hubby sighed and noted, "Eileen. The reviewer is saying, You're brilliant."

At which point, Fred or some other drunk at the table snorted -- "Yeah...she's being called brilliant but she doesn't get that this reviewer is calling her brilliant. Ironic or what?"

From there, the weekend continued -- and still continues since the New Yorkers still won't leave my house -- to deteriorate...

LUSH POETICS

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.

Such is the frailty of poetry (publishing) economics. 'Twas enough to drive me to drink, and I did. First, I polished off some left-over 1998 Finca Dofi Priorat. Then I popped the 1996 Clos Clare shiraz...which I am currently enjoying. Sip.

Poetry -- it ain't just lush but it turns one into a lush.

A PRIZE(D) ADMISSION

I rarely talk publicly about when people nominate me for poetry prizes. I don't talk about the *nominations* because if I don't get the prize I'm being nominated for, I get deeply embarassed. For myself and the editors who nominated me.

One can talk forever about how responses to poems (all art) is subjective and all that. But though I don't cringe if a journal editor doesn't nominate my poem(s) for, say, the Pushcart Prize, I somehow cringe when they do nominate a poem and it doesn't get the award. That doesn't even make sense, does it.

On one list serve, this topic came up a few months back and I was humored (even as I empathetically cringed) over a poet sharing how there was this one editor who consistently nominated his poems for the Pushcart for numerous years until, one day, they discussed it and just mutally agreed that the editor should stop nominating him anymore. Because it was just getting to be too much work for the editor to fill out the forms for that particular poet's work that consistently has not been to the Pushcart people's tastes. Because it was getting to be too painful for that poet and editor to discuss, year after year, that, cough, the poem didn't get the final Pushcart nod.

Anyway, I don't keep track so I don't know the exact number but I've been nominated for the Pushcart for probably more than a dozen times. This year, I have three nominations for the Pushcart and one for Best of the Net.

In the past, upon hearing of my nominations, I have felt grateful, said Thank you to the editors, but then pull in to my own embarrassment. I've never even publicly acknowledged, until this post, the Best of the Net Nomination by WOMB Poetry which was revealed this past September (and I do so now by publicly thanking them).

I'm writing this post now because I'm thinking -- what exactly is my embarrassment to the Grace being shown by the nominating editors? Nada. I want to show gratitude to those who've liked my work well enough to nominate them for such prizes. So thank you, too, to SENTENCE for its Pushcart nomination which I've just learned. I want to thank you within five minutes of hearing about it, hence this post. Because one should always never be ashamed of these moments of Grace.

I mean, I won't win (there she goes....sigh) but, truly -- sincerely and humbly -- I am grateful that you liked my poems.

MOI CAN EVEN TOPPLE CORPORATE GOLIATHS!

Well, the would-be Babaylan thinks as she pats pats some lavender lotion over her battle scars, That was exhausting.

But another day, another Goliath toppled...

She turns to look at her avid Peeps. I just know, Moi says, you're wondering what I'm talking about.

Well, I'ma talking about having just received payment for a 7-month old order from BARNES AND IGNOBLE. In case you don't know, this is a corporate that's particularly inhospitable to indie publishers. It's not uncommon for invoice payments to be delayed, especially if you're a small company with no volume clout; I know of at least one publisher out there who only sells to B&N if they prepay their orders.

Anyway, I was wrestling them on this ridiculous invoice all year. 'Twas an unnecessarily contentious invoice, but I handled it with steel, grit and the grace for which I am deservedly well-renowned. Indeed, I only had to flare out the muscular wing span just once. People don't generally know, you see, just how muscular angels are.

Preeeen!!!!!

Still, since the matter at hand was poetry book sales, I will net from this 7-month turmoil exactly ... $0.00. My author will get all the cash while I...while I [insert the scratching of the Moi head to figure out what Moi gets out of this] while I get to lower the pile from my In Box by one more piece of paper.

Awww Yeaaaaahh!!

And such goes yet another tale from the life of a poetry publisher.

"PAY IT FORWARD" -- A *)(*&)&%^& POETICS

A poet sent me a manuscript. He is requesting a blurb. He didn't ask ahead of sending the manuscript whether I would be inclined to give a blurb (you peeps who know me know my, um, attitude to blurbs, yah?), whether I would have time to read his manuscript, whether a blurb is subject to my actually liking the poems....he just landed his ejaculation on moi in-box. Nearly 200 pages.

And. He requested the blurb "next week."

Astonishing.

Whenever I've requested blurbs (not for myself in recent years but for others), I give months for blurbers to do them because I want to be respectful of their schedules.

None of that here.

But I'm going to do it. I'm going to give him a blurb.

Why? Because in that request lies a lifetime of insecurities and neediness and ego with which we all are afflicted but seems to get heightened among artists -- an occupational hazard, perhaps? And I don't want to respond with my knee-jerk reaction of thinking this poet to be an insecure, needy, egotistical jerk.

In my newbie poet phase, I was once an insecure, needy, egotistical jerk (well, I'm still a jerk but hopefully not as much as I used to be). But back then, I had a rare mentor who took my shit and didn't reject. So now I PAY IT FORWARD. I am compelled to pay it forward. (Actually, I'm fine with paying it forward -- but why paying forward has to be a *)*^%^&^& pain in the butt...!? !? !?)

And, after all, there are the poems. "The poem is the poet's best self" (or something like that)--Ted Berrigan

In a way, I consider this blurb request a test. I've had a horrific two-to-three weeks with various encounters with poets -- I don't know why they all occurred simultaneously in the same period; but on top of my usual multi-tasking schedule, the experience is enough to make me return to hermit-dom.

Then this blurb request. I'm going to do it. I'm going to be generous and compassionate...and get beyond you other poets who so often take advantage of others -- who so often take advantage of my stupidly stupidly stupidly generous self.