Of Looking At A Blackbird

Cherry-filled Chocolates and Other Thoughts

2011-08-16T16:28:00.000-07:00

The house is enveloped in fog, but I am slowly coming back to the world, even though it is not only 16 years since we have not had our dog, but almost 30 years since we didn't have the responsibility of another creature — now it's just John and me and the various appliances, services, and equipment that seem to be absorbing our night and day, sucking our lifeblood. Yes, we finally got reliable Internet (goodbye AT&T), and we're working on getting cable television, phone, and the like working again.

But I've been thinking about that review, that contra-review, that everyone seems to be talking about. And I've been thinking about various remarks friends have posted on FB and in their blogs: so-and-so is not a proper poet, they would rather walk on nails than read so-and-so, while others extol the virtues of the selfsame poets and applaud them. Another piece recently on Slate gathered the thoughts of various well-known fictionistas and asked them to confess which classic novels they have not been able to read. In that piece, Elif Batuman says, "My view is that the right book has to reach you at the right time, and no person can be reached by every book. Literature is supposed to be beautiful and/or necessary—so if at a given time you don't either enjoy or need a certain book, then you should read something else, and not feel guilty about it." This is my view too, and the point I want to make about poetry. I mean, can't we all get along? Seriously!

If I were to list the poets (past, present, and probably future too) whose work I don't care for, don't like, don't get, I would probably lose hella credibility. Let's face it. There are poetry gods and then poetry minions, like me. But while I do not care for Berryman (ouch!), I do not run around saying he wasn't a poet. See, I love chocolate and I'm fond of cherries, but I have never cared for those cherry-filled chocolates that many others adore. But do I go around insisting that they are not candy, that they shouldn't be in your box of chocolates?

Perhaps it's a silly analogy, but you get my point. I think there's room for you to like Berryman and for me to like Plath. I don't think the world will end if Phil Levine is Poet Laureate, as it didn't end when it was Kay Ryan or Ted Kooser.

If you don't want to read something, read something else.

End of the dog era

2011-08-07T20:17:00.000-07:00

Today was Greta's last day. I could go back and check my journals, and I'm not that sure, but it may be 16 years to the day that we picked up the cutest little 9-week old puppy from the SPCA, and that's also where she left us. I did not decide to let her go — I let John do it. So many things went wrong with her, that, well, if they could have brought her back to her happy self, I would have done whatever was necessary, whatever it cost, but the vet didn't think there was much chance that she would ever be well again, and there were signs that she might have kidney or liver failure or both. A lot of negatives, but I think her cry of anguish at 6:00 this morning was the worst. The rest of the details, well John knows and I know, but I will leave you with this picture of her in happier days. Maybe in the next week I'll post some puppy pics too.

We brought her in in her little red wagon, and that's the way she exited the world, wrapped in blankets, while we kissed her head and held her paws and told her how much we loved her.

```````````````````````

It was exactly 16 years. I checked my old journal.

Posted some puppy pics on Facebook for friends who asked:

Puppy Greta at Burning Man, September 1995

Dream email

2011-08-06T15:03:00.000-07:00

Yeah, someone emailed me in my dream to ask me whether the name of my new book will be Hue and Cry or Hue & Cry, with the ampersand. According to the dream messenger, it will make all the difference, the decision. I think the dream messenger was hinting that the ampersand title was best, only now I'm not sure.

Foggy day, but we could not get the dog in to see the vet today. We'll try again for tomorrow.

There's some lack of clarity about date (September 11? 22?), but the group is fixing to do a group reading at Booksmith on Haight. The idea is to video it and put the videos on YouTube. More about this when the date is certain.

Sunday evening

2011-07-17T22:16:00.000-07:00

Sleepy. Our socked in summer fog lifted, shortly after our visitors left, before noon, and the day turned gorgeous. John could not resist going out on the bike, and I, still in exhausted introvert recovery from people and cleaning and cooking and eating and drinking (not to mention taking care of the dog) just stayed home. But I could not stay in either, and found myself weeding and working out front and doing my share of sweat equity, though you could not say that it actually got what you would call hot.

Sweet potato chips with beer later, during the cocktail hour, and then a glass of pinot grigio with dinner (eggplant cutlets with broiled mozzarella for me, and a really nice salad). The Maytag clothes dryer, 22 years old, keeps shutting off, and besides, sounds like it's drying sand when it's on, which John says means the bearings are shot. We haven't even recovered from the tv going out; it's in the shop again (third time). But, I don't know, I'm not going to let a dryer get me down. Seems like there are more important things.

As I said on FB, Harvard Review #40 came in the mail yesterday, with my poem "A Study in Chiarascuro" on p. 96, and I'm pleased, a poem I liked, though the poetry group basically did not, so HR's taking it was some vindication. It's an odd poem that I'd rather not explain, one of those poems that feels like someone else wrote it.

But I honestly could use something good happening to me, for me, now: a poem accepted, a possibility of a pay check. John's got a part-time gig teaching photography for the city, starting in August. Other things too; he's on a roll. Maybe it will be my turn soon.

Up to date

2011-06-30T14:56:00.000-07:00

I've started posts about the amazing and successful Kickstarter experience with John's book project. And I've started a post about the recent benefit reading for Dean Young at UC Berkeley, from my personal point of view. And now I want to point you to Jeannine Hall Galley's interview with me (thanks, Jeannine!) on her blog. So this blog post attempts to do all of that (and more) and bring you up to date.

First, the Kickstarter. We are, as some of you know, in rather dire straits financially — well, in that matter we are hardly different from a great many others. But at the same time, we're both trying to complete art projects and put them out for the world in the form of books. Publishing, for me, for my second book of poetry, is not unlike the first. At this point, I'm entering second-book competitions and approaching some publishers through open readings. Hue and Cry has evolved from its original version in 2008, and I'm pretty happy with it and optimistic about its success. John's fine art photography project is a much more ambitious enterprise, and for that we used Kickstarter. His goal was/is to use the funds generated to finance the creation of a book dummy by a top book designer and hopefully convince a publisher that his book is worthy to publish. Well, I don't want to say much more here other than succeeding with Kickstarter seemed utterly hopeless at first (if you don't make your pledge goal, you end up with nothing) and then, thanks to our incredible friends and family, it worked! (More news on his book to come, when there is something to report.)

The benefit reading was June 23rd. I had already contributed what I could to Dean, whom I adore, but I was very excited by the terrific slate of readers. In addition to hearing them read, I hoped to meet Michael Wieger, of Copper Canyon, who was responsible for placing my poems in the voices of Picasso's women friends / lovers / wives on Narrative. Well, after a glass of wine, I did approach him. We talked about the Picasso exhibit that's now in the De Young, and he told me that he visited that show in Seattle with his daughter and took my poems with him to help relate to the paintings. This made me very, very happy!

There's not that much to say about Jeannine's interview with me other than she's a super poet (her She Returns to the Floating World, will be published by Kitsune Books in late 2011) and very nice person, and I hope you go read the interview.

Well, houseguests have come and gone. We've returned to applying for jobs, keeping our fingers crossed, and fixing up the house in case we have to sell it — what passes for normal these days, chez nous.

Mom Poem

2011-05-07T08:17:00.000-07:00

Mom Poem

“I read poetry to save time.” — Marilyn Monroe

Mom and Marilyn

My mother and the Argentines loved Marilyn,

the kitten smile, the take-me glamour.

In Buenos Aires they stand in line for hours

to get to touch the shimmering green gown

beaded with six thousand rhinestones

that Marilyn wore the night she sang

her breathy happy

birthday to Kennedy.

Mom treasured a recipe from ’54 —

a pineapple upside down cake —

because on the reverse of the yellowed clip

Joe DiMaggio bestows a wedding kiss

on Marilyn’s inspiring lips

and on her hand, an eternity band

of 35 diamonds.

Mom Sets Foot In Another Country

Here and here, she’s not allowed,

although she can just see in,

as through the windows of a house

she once lived in, in another country

where she made coffee first thing in the morning

for sixty years, and now this thing called coffee

is bird tracks on the beach, the birds themselves

departing skyward, eroding sand.

Archaeologist, she figures

how the woman in yesterday’s kitchen

would stand, where she would put

the dirt-brown dust in the pot

and where the water. How

new the world is!

She tosses out the cups and saucers

after breakfast because they are used.

Mom at Sea

Mom sits on the couch where we put her,

small boat moored on a brocade ocean.

A cloud settles; each day it covers more of her face.

Mom Comes to Me in a Dream

Naugahyde on a balsa wood frame,

face down on the carpet. It’s Mom,

complaining about being left in that state.

I start over to her. Yes,

it’s one of those dreams

where you need a thumb’s perspective

on interstellar space.

Michelangelo’s God gestures toward Adam:

There they are, on the ceiling,

fingers drawing further apart—

at arm’s length, so to speak,

though face to face.

Quite the gap to spark. Time

for Noah’s flood and his ark,

for the multitudes in twos, and the dove

bringing back the olive. Not godforsaken,

God help me. I sit her up. It’s morning.

Mom Comes to me From Past and Future

East on 580, south I-5 and 99, I drive

The Valley, past growers’ billboards

for nuts and fruit. Twenty years from now

I will see a pistachio

and think: My mother is dead.

Among rows of irrigated almonds

an old Ohlone pounding acorns on a rock

looks up across centuries

to where I pass on the Interstate.

Mom Unpacked

How my arms upraised to pull back my hair

look like my mother’s. How I fold

one glove into the other so they are holding hands

and tuck the tidy package in the jacket pocket

as she would do. How when Scott says,

inoperable brain cancer this afternoon

it’s Mom I see announcing at the pool

that she’d an illness to trump her friends’

arthritis, hip replacements, and cardiac infarcts.

She said it the same way she’d tell you she

was first in her class in Walton Girls Latin.

Then she tripped on the beach chair

and glared at me as I helped her up.

It’s the illness, I tell myself, and the next day

at Henri’s buying tomatoes: When I want tomatoes,

I want tomatoes, grabbing the bag from me, packing

tomatoes to outlast her. Can’t you do anything?

They would have cried if they’d been animal.

Mom Sees a Lake

What does it look like

from there, Mom? You have

no god, no taste for fiction,

no mortar to brick immortal story.

We hang on to your words,

to any indication of soaring

above this bed.

Mom Asks, Doves Assent

After a while, there’s nothing to say.

Mourning doves have built a nest

in the locust at the end of the terrace

after a short courtship. You wait on your back

in the small bed of your marriage,

propped on pillows, for instructions.

How does one die? — bit by bit,

but it takes practice. Your whole life

you sharpened your pencils, did your lessons.

Good, say the doves,

good, good, good, good girl.

Second place in the Nimrod / Hardiman in 2004, published in Best New Poets 2005, also in Conjugated Visits, published by Dream Horse Press

"Better"

2011-04-15T22:09:00.000-07:00

I read twice in one week — unusual for me. The Monday reading was in Village Books, in Pacific Palisades. It meant flying down to LA (Long Beach, actually) and staying with my sister in LA, in mid-city. That was the good part, because she's a real sweetheart and I'm totally comfortable with her. She chauffeured me around, took me and her beautiful daughter, my niece, Veronika, to Huntington Gardens. (We saw a haunting exhibit of the work of John Frame), and came to my reading at "Moonday in the Village." I wish I had something better to say about this reading. Not knowing many in LA, I thought it would be fine to have a co-featured reader (it was; Carol V. Davis is a wonderful poet) and to share the night with an open mike (it wasn't). The open mike was before and after the features; the readers, nearly all apparently regulars who come to hear themselves, are allowed to read two poems each, and, well best not to go on or I'll get in trouble, but there were a lot of poems about springtime … The worst was that no one really connected with my work. I heard someone later mumbling about how I wrote about science. Well, my images are sometimes unusual and complicated, but I don't usually stump the audience.

Thursday, last night, back in the Bay Area, I read at Peg Pursell's Why There Are Words reading in Sausalito. You may know that this series features prose, and I didn't have a lot to chose from, so don't know that I fulfilled my mission of reading about the theme "Better." I read my "81" piece, in the voice of a Hell's Angels guy I met walking the dog, a piece called "Good Luck Bad Luck Laundry," that went back to stories I'd heard in Camp Mather about 15 years ago, and finally, I read "La Vie (en Rose)," a published prose poem that will be in my next collection. Who knows if they loved me? Who cares? They listened! I felt my energy communicate with them. It was what is supposed to happen. I really enjoyed (and listened to) the other readers too: Seth Fischer, Molly Fisk, Leah Griesmann, David Lukas, and Tracy Seeley, so, it's not all about me. I totally encourage you to check out this reading series that occurs every second Thursday at Studio 33 on Caledonia Street in Sausalito, CA at 7 PM.

Is Anybody Home?

2011-03-22T15:27:00.000-07:00

It seems as if I don't exist, or at least if my email were proof of my existence, it would be very sad. Okay, I'm not getting offered any jobs. I haven't gotten any good po biz mail since early December. But what about simple informational emails? Are my recommendations up to date for such and such? Is the April reading happening there? Somebody answer me!

Of course, I'm exaggerating, but not that much. I thought I would babble on about this strange way I write poems, sometimes. If nobody's reading anyway, well …

I play games with the poem. I don't look at it for hours, sweating bullets. I don't look at it for hours at all. I may work on it for days or weeks or even longer, but it's in five minute snatches, where I pretend I'm not working at all. I look at it. I'll notice, for instance, a predominance of certain sounds at the end of a line, so I cut and paste to accentuate that. Then I turn away, do something else, check FB. Later, I sneak a peek. Do I like that? Does it work? Maybe not.

I switch to something else, something that's sat in my computer for years, or something scribbled in half sleep the night before. I work on that for five ten minutes, put it down, make a cup of tea. Sometimes I'm working on four poems at a time, maybe more. This method may have evolved when I was busier raising my son and running to work, but I don't remember if I used it then. I wrote a few stories and essays, recently, and enjoyed the ongoingness of the process. I like having something simmering on the back burner. I like lying in bed at night trying to find the one word that will fix a certain problem line (though I admit it's more often than not a recipe for insomnia).

Each time I go back to the poem, in those five-minute snatches, I see/hear different things. Sometimes the poem seems entirely new! I'm having fun with it, and yeah, that's a good thing.

My two cents

2011-03-10T14:33:00.000-08:00

Greta is having a hard time with J. away. As a consequence, she kept me up a good part of the night, whining to get up, to get out, to come in, to get back down in/on her bed, to be rearranged in a more comfy position — none of which she can do without help. I LOVE my dog, but I had to keep telling myself that each time she woke me up …

And I was having trouble sleeping, anyway. I was thinking about the Rankine / Hoagland debate, kind of retroactively, yes. It was reminding me of something, and I finally placed it. To those who are unfamiliar with the subject, please just google those names and perhaps the word "race." I just did and got 140,000 results. I'm too lazy to link to any.

The thing was, all of a sudden, I remembered a conversation with my father-in-law. I'd been married to his son for decades. We were out doing the tourist thing in Boston, the four of us, and we stopped somewhere for coffee. That was when my father-in-law took it into his head to tell me that his mother had hated Jews, considered them greedy, money-grubbing, and filthy, wouldn't do business in a Jew-owned store, and wouldn't let a Jew in her house. I'd known my husband's family for more than a decade before we were married; the fact that I'm from a Jewish family is very old news, and I didn't know where this came from. Eventually I realized that my father-in-law was congratulating himself for being open minded enough to drink coffee with me. He didn't seem to care that what he was telling me (though I never knew the woman and she was no longer alive) was hurtful, that these words once put in the air would stay there, contaminating everything. He just wanted to pat himself on the back for being a good liberal. It wasn't even about me (or Jews).

I think that TH's poem "The Change" is at best self serving and, at worst, racist, though it is a poem that passes one of my tests for art, which is that it makes you see/think/perceive differently from before coming across it. Its assumption is that for the poet or persona to have his epiphany (to win it is no longer enough to be white?) it is worth exhuming attitudes that were better (because untrue, ugly, and hurtful) buried, attitudes that are so baroque as to seem to arise not in the 21st century but from the thought patterns of a slave-owning society. (To think that some of us already thought this "change" had long since come!)

So now those descriptions will hang there, affecting, infecting: the racists among us feeling supported because they're not the only ones to think those ugly thoughts, and, what? should African American women feel apologetic because one of them, in this poem, had the gall to win?

This n' That

2011-02-23T22:17:00.000-08:00

So we're going to have snow — maybe — this Friday or Saturday. Exciting to speculate about, but I'll believe it when I see it. I've seen actual snow, that is, not hail, once since we moved here 35 years ago. I was working on Sansome, downtown, the 19th floor or something like that. Standing at the window, I could see fat flakes, big and moist as kisses go by the plate glass, but their love was gone before they hit the ground.

Funny writing here. I'm beginning to believe I have no readers, or almost none. Ever since Robert stopped posting, all his fans stopped coming by. I know I'm not as erudite as he is. I see things from my own narrow view. But not having to worry about people reading this is also a sort of freedom. Who cares what I say here?

So here goes: Why do people crow about Pushcart nominations? They're nice, but unless they actually turn into a prize, who cares? Don't most of us get nominated year after year?

This is a photo of my Valentine's Day roses. I took it a day or so ago, but they are still lovely and give me a lot of pleasure.

Yes, I am running out of steam. Maybe I'll write more later.

Late Night Thoughts

2011-02-11T20:08:00.000-08:00

It's no secret that I've been reading a lot of fiction lately, finding genre fiction (detective stories) freeing in a way that television fails at, and good fiction, the likes of Munroe, Stroud, Baker, Moore, to be almost as skin-tinglingy perfect as poetry. I read mostly at night. Though I'm unemployed and my day is embarrassingly free, I try to fill it with purposeful actions: looking at job postings, sending out résumés and submissions — okay, and Facebook. But reading in bed has its drawbacks. Sometimes I'm so excited by what I read, I enter into a mental conversation with the writer that keeps me awake. The conversation may take the form of phrases to post here. At least three times lately, I've written volumes of such pillowtalk in my head.

Last night, reading the Birds of America story by Lorrie Moore called "Agnes of Iowa," I came upon this: "Every arrangement in life carried with it the sadness, the sentimental shadow, of its not being something else …" and I thought, that's why she writes stories, that's the reason to be a writer! To not have to choose — or anyway, to have, in some measure the arrangement and the something else as well. Maybe that isn't what she meant, but it works for me.

Oh yes: found a newspaper cutout — not even a coupon, just a picture — of BumbleBee Chunk Light Tuna In Water — stuck in my Lorrie Moore book, from the library. How perfect!

Not really new

2011-01-24T12:25:00.000-08:00

Connotation Press republished the interview they did and pieces they took last year. I thought I'd seen them before, and I had. Of course, that makes the bio of me one year old, but that's okay. It's good to maybe get a few more people to read these.

Loving Nicholson Baker's The Anthologist. It's so much fun, I'm forcing John to listen to bits read aloud.

BTW, walking more than a mile, with a steep uphill finish, then hot bath and a glass of port before bed = a very good night's sleep. That and the great weather (yeah I know you Back Easterners are suffering, but it's positively spring here), has impelled me into a decent mood, for a change. But it's tenuous. Okay, I expected that rejection, but still.

Something good needed here, poetry gods. Small, but good.

Did yoga this morning and will tackle the back yard jungle this afternoon. It's very funny to do upward dog face to face with my doggie.

Interim post

2011-01-23T23:17:00.000-08:00

Okay, this isn't a real post, just an interim post to say that I know it's about time I write something here, and I plan to real soon. I've been on a reading binge, reading actual novels, some good stuff (Lorrie Moore: wow!), some jes' plain escapism (mystery novels). I haven't been able to read like this in years, and it's no doubt a measure of how much I need to escape my life that this means of travel is open to me once more. Well, it's better than booze and dope, no?

Though many would drool over my present situation: gorgeous weather, sunny and 60s, no bloomin' work, no prospect of any. Will do more revision tomorrow and work in the garden. Looks like hell back there. And read some more.

Not being objective

2011-01-07T13:58:00.000-08:00

Again, I don't know what I'm going to blog about, will just go for it. Last night, I could not sleep. I thought, my bones feel like lead, heavy and poisonous. I was not dead tired, rather, alive. I felt the weight of gravity. Life sitting on my chest.

I've been thinking of my post below, on Art, and how stupid it must sound — earnest and trying, but stupid still. I'm terrible at argument. It always seemed to me outrageous that debates would be scored on how well the persons argued, not on merit, who was right.

When I was a girl, my brother and father used to goad me into argument. They would say such things as "no woman was ever a great artist." I would lose my argument (they said) by getting emotional. It was fun for them, watching me turn red and stomp away in tears (always tears).

In any case, if I really held to what I say, I would post a link to the blog post below on Facebook, so people would read the damn thing, and we could have a conversation. But I don't know. I'm afraid to.

Do you think that all art is subjective? A friend posts he is surprised when his work is turned down, because he likes it. I'm rather surprised when mine is picked up. I like mine too. A book catalog arrived in today's mail. Nicely done. One could definitely do worse than be in their stable. Do I think the samples they printed therein were heavenly, way out of reach? Not at all. They were okay.

Art or Not

2011-01-02T20:41:00.000-08:00

In this first post of the year, I want to respond to two recent conversations about Art. I've been thinking of doing this for a while, but have not really planned what I'm going to say, because the subject is so overwhelming. I'm no expert, no scholar. But I want to discuss this here because I find myself unable to, in conversation; the only way I know how to think this out is by writing it.

Both conversations, basically, argue for Art that is easy — not easy to create, oh no, but easy to comprehend, to understand. In one, the person making the claim said that what Jackson Pollock did is not Art. In the second conversation (we were talking about the pretensions of much of the art world and of a fun movie called "(Untitled)" that pokes fun at those pretensions) the claim was made that what Andy Warhol did is not Art. [Sidenote: for Robert Thomas's take on this subject and comparisons with poetry and its pretensions, see his post on an earlier incarnation of this blog at http://dianekmartin.blogspot.com/2005/05/jackson-pollock-vs-andy-warhol.html.]

I am, for the sake of this post, including, in my definition of Art, poetry and other literary genres, music, dance, photography, film, and so forth. It is my opinion that Art is nurtured in the thin air of the mountain at the tree line. Below this line, all the trees are green; the Art that everyone likes grows here. And above, the air is so thin that maybe only the gallery owners, the publishers, the gatekeepers asseverate that Art can live there. But at the tree line, well, it's where the strange twisted thoughts take root, some to live and some to perish. Beethoven's work was once considered abominable. The Impressionists, with their lovely light-enfused happily mass produced canvasses that are now dwell over the couch in your in-laws' living room — they were once considered ugly and strange, Not Art.

But I think by the time that piece is selected to match the color scheme of the in-laws' couch and walls, it's gone from Not Art through Art and back to Not Art again. It's pretty. It's decorative. It doesn't bother anyone. It's not Art.

Roberta Smith, discussing her favorite paintings in the NY Times the other day (December 30, 2010) said it well: "Paintings, like poetry or music, are essential nutrients that help people sustain healthy lives. They’re not recreational pleasures or sidelines. They are tools that help us grasp the diversity of the world and its history, and explore the emotional capacities with which we navigate that world. They illuminate, they humble, they nurture, they inspire. They teach us to use our eyes and to know ourselves by knowing others." Well, I agree with this. I agree with Picasso who said (paraphrased) that the artist must rouse you from your waking sleep.

It's the same with poetry, with music. I do not get quite a lot, most, in fact, contemporary classical music or, on the other end of the spectrum, the work that's called hip-hop. But I know it can be Art. Does that mean I have to like it or listen to it? Or, in the case of poetry, practice Erasures or Flarf? As Matisse said (paraphrased) that is a country where I cannot go. But all the same, it is there.

Do you trust your emotions? If it brings a tear, does that tell you it's the real thing? You're better than I, then, because the Olympic torch brings a tear to my eye and a lump to the throat. That doesn't make it Art.

I guess I'm willing to give the artist the benefit of the doubt. I know that that which grows on the tree line may be, eventually, the classic, the piece that will make someone nod and know, finally see or hear or understand. The Emperor's new clothes? Perhaps. But there is a difference between being close minded and being sheep.

I will have my opinions. But I know I've learned to like — to love — what I once turned my nose up at before.

BTW, I hope to get some comments here. Let's have a conversation!

Last post of 2010

2010-12-31T15:01:00.000-08:00

I should have a plan for this last post of the year. Maybe a resolution or two. Okay: Write poems, get more exercise. That's enough. Maybe a summation of the year: a good one, from a personal perspective. Each of us got a book out. Stayed well. Traveled. Plans for the new year: each of us has another book to get out. John is excited about his class. Hopes for the new year: a job? a solution to our money problems? Dog to stay with us a little bit longer.

I don't know where this blog fits in with the new year. I met a few who read it, this year. But I'm not sure it's contributing much to the universe or even this small planet.

Magpie Beauty

2010-12-27T21:23:00.000-08:00

This morning we packed up all the Xmas candy and put it in the kitchen cabinets. That doesn't mean I haven't visited those cabinets today, but at least one is less likely to grab handfuls.

This poem was in Poetry Daily, the poem from last year. I love the "magpie beauty" and the first stanza, especially. Gonna use that for a title. I'm going to try, anyway. Here's the poem, by Frank Bidart:

For an Unwritten Opera

Once you had a secret love: seeing
even his photo, a window is flung open
high in the airless edifice that is you.

Though everything looks as if it is continuing
just as before, it is not, it is continuing
in a new way (sweet lingo O'Hara and Ashbery

teach). That's not how you naturally speak:
you tell yourself, first, that he is not the air
you need; second, that you loathe air.

As a boy you despised the world for replacing
God with another addiction, love.
Despised yourself. Was there no third thing?

But every blue moon the skeptical, the adamantly
disabused find themselves, like you,
returned to life by a secret: like him, in you.

Now you understand Janácek at
seventy, in love with a much younger
married woman, chastely writing her.

As in Mozart song remains no matter how
ordinary, how flawed the personae. For us poor
mortals: private accommodations. Magpie beauty.

Frank Bidart
The Threepenny Review

The Latest Adventure

2010-12-18T18:41:00.000-08:00

I suddenly (as in a few days ago) woke up to the concept of entering my book — and asking my publisher to enter my book in various contests for best poetry books of 2010. It's not that I really think I stand a chance (and I missed a lot of the biggies anyway), but why not try? You gotta be in it to win it, as my mother-in-law says, though she is probably talking about the lottery.

Most of the contests I hadn't already missed had end-of-year or even end-of-January deadlines, so here I was entering information in an online form for one of them, not really pressed. And then I got stuck when they wanted my publisher's phone number, which I'd never used. So I emailed him, John and I had dinner, and we settled into our respective laptops in the living room. Not having that much else to do, I looked through old email and found my publisher's phone number, and entered it in the form and hit Send. At which point, I got a reply that the form went through and I should now see to it that six copies of my book were sent by a midnight December 17 postmark. This was at around 8:30 in the evening on December 17! I uttered a few choice words and thought that was that. But then I got an idea. Lo, Google told me that there was a San Francisco post office near the airport open until midnight.

It was pouring rain. I don't drive at night, definitely don't drive at night in the rain (unless someone's life depends on it) and I'd had a glass and a half of 2-buck Chuck to boot. But thanks to John and our GPS, we made it. Hurray and then some! Not that it matters in the least, as I said, but small victories count for something in this dice-loaded-against-you world.

Yes, and I'm happy to celebrate the repeal of DADT from this "liberal bastion," though it seems to me that the right to fight in a war is a strange right indeed. On the personal side, yay for unemployment benefits extension, though I applied for a wonderful job the other day, and would like very much to be working again in 2011.

Hollow days

2010-12-14T10:20:00.000-08:00

Okay, despite my cute and totally gloomy title here, things could be worse. We're hoping the extension of unemployment benefits doesn't get lost in the arguments about what should or should not be under the rich folks' Christmas trees. And a few job possibilities exist for me, of which the less said, the better.

Some bank business to take care of today. Other than that, I hope we'll spend some quality, if damp, time with the pooch. She's been so pathetic each time we've left her lately. Last night, she wasn't hoarsely barking when we got back, as she was Saturday, just looking reproachful and putting her head up for a scritch. Greta is on her way to 16 now, and pretty blind, we think, and sad, and she can't get up without us. We walk her with the old red wagon, and when she stops and is totally outta gas, we plunk her in the wagon and give her a roll around the block. She still looks beautiful, her fur still lovely.

It's been a very good year for acceptances for me — for individual poems — though one is never satisfied and I'd love to bring the grand total up to 25 before the year's end. As for Hue and Cry, it's out there, but I need to continue to work on it, make it better.

Crumbs

2010-12-03T12:31:00.000-08:00

Oh, I'll take them. The fact that Congress has not voted to re-up Unemployment Benefits and we will probably be forced to sell our house is uppermost in my mind — things we counted on happening just haven't.

In the meantime, I'm working on revamping our second "bedroom," our office, to fit John's workstation and printers, so he won't have to work in the cold basement. See, I still hope for miracles.

And other crumbs: an acceptance of three more poems, bringing my unbelievable total for 2010 to 24! And a nomination for the Pushcart from Smartish Pace. You know, I'll take these small pieces of hope. An old friend was shot dead the other day. How is such a thing possible? But we're still alive.

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N. helped us network the printers so that they can stay downstairs (one is large and the other is huge). We're still working things out so that we can continue here, continue working. Do we have our heads in the sand? Possibly.

Simple

2010-11-27T17:01:00.000-08:00

Having experienced the amazing phenomenon of a full-night's sleep, I was a domestic whirlwind today. I made pumpkin muffins. I made lentil soup. The storm comes and goes: dark clouds, rain, and wind, then clearing, with a horizon that stretches out forever, blueish shadows in the underside of the clouds, and pink highlights above the cold, distant hills.

It is peaceful here, post holiday. It is warm enough inside. We are hunkering down. It will be a simple Christmas here, simply because there is no money. We are hanging on by a thread. If the banks restructure our loans, we will be able to hang on longer, maybe, but we simply need more income: jobs, grants, miracles. Let us know if you hear of any.

Onward

2010-11-22T11:29:00.000-08:00

Rough night last night. Between the dog's tribulations and our financial worries, sleep just wouldn't arrive, no matter how tired I was. But I was also thinking about Hue and Cry. The first book took way too long to come out, with too goddamn many finalist notices. And the longer it took, the more problematic publishing became. I don't want this to happen with number two. But already, almost half the book has been taken by journals, and I'm confident that this time it will get some recognition (and money; I could really use some money!).

So when the rejection came this morning, I was ready for it, and not all that upset. I'm thinking this book has better things in store for it.

Words into Air

2010-11-14T21:47:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I finished Words Into Air, the Complete Correspondence Between Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell. A fascinating book, with more plot and suspense and more of history's pageant than any recently read novel. Beyond the history, the elections and coups and assassinations and protests, are the portraits of the writers of their day, from "that Catholic girl fiction writer," Flannery O'Conner, to Randall Jarrell, Marianne Moore, Robert Frost, Ezra Pound, WC Williams, Allen Tate, Dylan Thomas, Mary McCarthy, Auden, Plath, Sexton, Bidart, Rexroth … and more. For shoptalk alone (criticism of each other's work) the book was wonderful. Okay, I didn't buy it; I have it from the library and renewed it three times — it's 800 pages! But well worth the time.

In other news: dreamed last night I went downtown for a haircut and encountered a lingerie fashion show for brides — you know, all that naughty stuff. And I couldn't get the haircut because all the men who were there for the show were getting shaves and haircuts (2 bits) and nose hairs trimmed as well.

Texas is big, but California is GIANTS!

2010-11-03T15:56:00.000-07:00

Heh heh, stole that from a poster photographed at the Giants' celebration and parade today and posted at SFGate.com. Rather concentrate on this win than the election (but hey, goodbye Meg Whitman) and the rather negative subject of my recent job search.

Someone else pointed out on FB that it's rather standard for the party in power to lose the house in mid-term elections, but unusual to keep the Senate as we did. But that's as much politics as I want to offer.

Getting motivated (or trying to ) for my LA reading on Friday. If you are in the area, come hear me and Rick Bursky and Millicent Accardi. I think it will be fun.

Been reading the rather voluminous complete correspondence of Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell. It seems the whole of the literary world passes in front of them. It is amusing that the names we consider rock solid today were fresh faces then.

Back to California / normal

2010-10-22T13:51:00.000-07:00

I am quite happy to be home and back in California. Since I grew up in the New York area and also spent some time in my youth in Boston, I couldn't help making comparisons, during my visit, wondering what it would be like to be living in those places. I liked my friend Dennis's neighborhood in Brooklyn as well as Manhattan, and I liked Belmont, Cambridge, Wellesley, Arlington, Somerville, and downtown Boston — all places I'm sure where I could live happily. But San Francisco definitely feels like home. Even on miserable wet days like today, the light is different; there's a sense of openness from the Pacific being out there. And people are more diverse here than anywhere, living more or less amicably, with some sense that we're all in this life business together.

Maybe I'm crazy and imagining all this … But anyway, GO GIANTS! During yesterday's SF Opera dress rehearsal (standing room only because of the presence of Placido Domingo), there was an undercurrent of excitement about the game, and, during the intermission, people turning on their phones frantically to find out the score. Of course, the Giants did not clinch last last, but that's just typical Giants. Winning in a clean sweep would be too easy. They have to drag it out and make us sweat!

I should say the readings in NYC and Boston went well. Attendance was a little underwhelming, but then I'm hardly a headliner. Those who did come seemed to like what they heard.

Next reading is Beyond Baroque, Friday, November 5th, at 7:30 PM. We are more than broke right now; we are in deep debt, definitely up a creek though perhaps not yet without a paddle. But I'm flying down for this reading, because it was planned in the hopeful days of early summer. I'm reading with two fabulous poets, Millicent Accardi and Rick Bursky. So come on out!

Uh oh

2010-09-19T18:22:00.000-07:00

Was innocently walking Greta on Ocean by Miramar, one of our old hangouts (yes, Greta is now somewhat — 4-blocks — ambient), when we passed by a small poster for the Friends of the San Francisco Library Book Sale. Now, we're talking about a household that should be selling, not buying books. And I'm unemployed! But, because I'm unemployed, I can go early. And often.

See you there!

Gonna concentrate on the poetry books. And I'll look at the photography books for John. Hey, it's September. It's almost Christmas.

Now, I don't know why the link didn't come through, showed like a big hole in this post. I've re-inserted it, but with no confidence.

Anyway, scored big at the sale, so big that I had an agonizing walk back to my car with several large heavy bags. Had to park up the street on my hill all day because of PG&E shenanigans. It's not been fun carrying a 40-pound dog, and I couldn't deal with the books. Hence they were still in the car until this morning, when I got them here.

Let's see: several photo books for John, a large Blake-illustrated version of Dante, and poems by: A. Sexton, J. Ashbery, C. Dennis, T. Lux, N. Flynn, E. Montale, M. Peacock, D. Baker, R. Dove., Y. Komunyakaa, P. Neruda, W. Stevens, R.M., Rilke, C. Twichell, L. Gluck, A. Rich, C.P. Cavafy, B. Collins, M. O'Rourke, O. De La Paz, C. Marvin, the Vintage anthology, ed. by McClatchey, and The Metaphysical Poets, ed. by Helen Gardner.

I'm sure I could get more today, only I'm not going back, unless someone else is carrying!

Saw Lisa and Erich.

[Link does not show. If someone knows why, tell me!]

Mixed Blessings

2010-09-12T14:12:00.000-07:00

[photo of Greta on a happier day]

First, in the you never know department … My entire section of Picasso women poems has been taken. Details to come, as I haven't signed a contract yet and an approval is involved. But I'm very thrilled. I sent out four of these as part of a 15-page query to a poetry publisher, in hopes of placing HUE AND CRY, and the book wasn't taken but these were. Probably the best rejection I've got, if not ever, in a long time.

Meanwhile, John is away at VCCA (and I haven't told him this yet, but I doubt he reads my blog), and Greta Garbo, our 15-year-old dog, is sick. She has an ear infection that is apparently giving her vertigo and makes her tilt. Poor little baby! I'm leaving in about an hour to attend Melissa Stein's reading, but then I have to rush home to wash Greta's ear with an earwash and give her some pills. (She hasn't eaten anything all day, and her favorite treat, a strip of dried chicken, sits untouched by her left foot. It's very sad.)

N&J helped me enormously last night, confirming that Greta wasn't just being weird 'cause John was gone, and drove and carried her into the all-night pet hospital for me. This ain't an Academy Award-type thank you: I could not have done it without them.

More later …

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Update on the above: I've signed an agreement with Narrative Magazine to publish all 12 of my "Picasso Women" poems, an entire section of my new manuscript (and they pay!). This brings my acceptance rate for 2010 to 19 poems! This is unbelievable! I'm so thrilled.

Greta is doing a bit better. The problem is an old-dog vestibular ailment rather than an ear infection per se. Yesterday we even tried a slight walk at 6:00-ish. Then she woke in the middle of the night for what seemed like no reason but was this morning revealed to be a raccoon intruder in the basement. Muddy paw prints and water bowl, not from G., as she's been upstairs. Good for Greta, my old watchdog, but unfortunately, not easy to get back to sleep. As a result, I now feel like shit.

Following up

2010-08-19T21:59:00.000-07:00

It's been almost three weeks since the fabulous events at Diesel Books and at Robert and Cheryl's. Everything went well, though I woke during the night after (did I actually sleep?) to realize I hadn't thanked Poetry Flash or Diesel Books aloud, during the reading. I hope they know how grateful I was …

I did thank Robert and Cheryl, at least on Facebook, though I can't really ever thank them enough. What a party! What a house! What a view! What a lucky person I am to have had all those people share the occasion of my book launch with me.

And now, moving on. The list of upcoming events is at right.

Can I say I wish I could move on. I'm ready to be living in my new book, Hue and Cry. Sure, there's more work to do before it's published, but I'm ready.

And I've been hard at work on a short story, a piece of fiction, set the summer of 1969.

Event-tually

2010-07-21T14:47:00.000-07:00

I've been slow to record the latest events. With less than two weeks remaining to the big launch of Conjugated Visits at Diesel Books in Oakland and then the party at Robert's house, more readings have begun to pile up. That sounds like they just happened, while the truth is, multiple emails, phone calls, and other pestering has been involved with each of them. So now, in addition to Diesel and the group reading at Pegasus, September 18, I will be reading at:

Poetry Club at the Bowery in NYC on October 10, with Kyle McCord, Keith Montesano, and Amy Holman

Third Life, in Somerville, MA with Mary Alexandra Agner on October 16

Beyond Baroque in Venice CA with Rick Bursky and Millicent Accardi, November 5

Bird & Beckett Books in San Francisco with Robert Thomas, November 15

A multi-poet event in Corte Madera sometime in November/December

Poetry Santa Cruz, CA March 19th, 2011

Moonday in the Village, Pacific Palisades CA April 11th, 2011

I will eventually put all this in a neat list, with more accurate information. Do not fear. Right now, I'm just delaying getting back to a story I started writing. Yes! A short story!

You see, last Saturday, I went to Jon Carroll's workshop at Book Passages on writing the personal essay. I learned a lot (I think), not even counting my extra lesson on not to make a U-turn in a "business district." But Jon thought the idea I had for the essay was more suited to a short story. So I am trying. But it is haaaaard!

Noo Yawk, Noo Yawk

2010-07-13T21:35:00.000-07:00

So I've got myself a reading in NYC, at Poetry Club of the Bowery. The date is Sunday, October 10, from 2–4 in the afternoon, and I will be reading with Kyle McCord, Keith Montesano, and Amy Holman, all of whom have been published by Dream Horse Press. I have found it much easier to get readings with at least one other reader. It seems that event coordinators are just happier to not put all their eggs in one unknown basket. I mean, god forbid you have the floor or the podium or the mike for one whole hour and no one shows up but your pet dog, wagging its tail. Oddly, though I've invited others to read with me, and they've been happy to, I've yet to get an actual invite from another. But in case you, out there, are looking for someone to share the spotlight with you in a little bookstore or poetry venue, I'm still eager to get something going in Boston, in Portland and Seattle or other towns in the Northwest, and in other places in California. Or your town. Try me!

Oh, it's not that I love flogging the book. Introvert that I am, I rather hate it. But it is what one does. Chances are I'm not going to get invited on Oprah, so it's up to me, isn't it, to give Conjugated Visits a life.

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I want to publicly apologize for the whining and poor little me attitude above. Yes, this book thing is an uphill climb — or many uphill climbs — but that's just the way it is. And it's not true, either, that I haven't had any encouragement and offers to share the dance floor. Certainly, I've had people meeting me halfway!

So please (you know who you are) forgive me for kvetching. I was tired and tired of trying, that's all.

The Wrong Stuff

2010-07-05T18:26:00.000-07:00

Woke up to a happy post from a friend that said a poem of mine was up at Verse Daily. Well, it turned out, they posted my poem with someone else's title (I don't know how you even do that!). Then it turns out they had someone else's bio, Wiki page, and website. Yeah, and they posted a link to two poems online that I didn't even remember existed. Well, at least they were mine, though rather old news.

I'm not in a good mood. I haven't really been doing any marketing for the book, am still two and two (two readings in SF and two in LA). I need to get some more things happening, but it feels so uphill. But for those who are interested (and not on Facebook), you should know that after the August 1 reading at Diesel, there will be a big party at Robert's house for my book. Directions to the party will be available at the Diesel/ Poetry Flash reading. If you just want to come to the party, well, okay, email me at dianekmartin (at) gmail (dot) com for directions.

Yeah, I've moved my email address to gmail.

N&J are moving to San Bruno. That means, when J and I move to Sebastopol, we won't have anyone with SF priority for Camp Mather booking. Oh well. It's been a long time and will probably be a long time yet. I need a job before we move anywhere.

Here's a super poem:
http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/poetry/2010/07/12/100712po_poem_plumly

Cezanne's still life and mine

2010-06-25T13:51:00.000-07:00

Maybe it's all this wet drippy fog (yes, a typical June). Maybe it's just the expected. But I am experiencing a definite letdown, anticlimax, maybe even depression. Conjugated Visits is out, and so what? I've done a bit to stir the waters; I'm sure I could do more.

I'm still awaiting delivery of my second box of books, having used up the first. If I promised you a book and/or you sent me your address, don't fret. I will send it.

I have sent off the new manuscript, Hue and Cry, to three places. While I was working on it, getting it ready to go out, I still felt productive and creative. Now, waiting, Conjugated Visits feels more than ever like history.

Did see the show of masterpieces from the d'Orsay that is now in SF at the de Young. That helped keep my mind off marketing and so forth for a while. BTW, has anyone out there ever worked as a museum guard? How long are the shifts, typically? No, not looking for this type of work, but could use the info for a new poem.

Socked-in Summer

2010-06-22T14:04:00.000-07:00

So here I am doing an interview / reading on KKUP 91.5, last Wednesday. The radio host was none other than my publisher, J.P. Dancing Bear. It was a pleasant enough experience, especially since John drove me to San Jose and probably no one I knew was listening. (The station is hard to get in many places.) I'll let all my fans know when the show will be posted on iTunes.

Today, we are socked in with fog, the usual summer weather in this part of San Francisco. It's hard to remember, on days like this, that it is summer elsewhere. We had the heat on this morning and the dog didn't want to go out, just to stay in front of the heating vent. So I sit here like a little ol' lady in my cardigan and shawl, trying to stay warm.

I know I should be trying to push my book more. I need to get more/earlier readings in the Bay Area, especially San Francisco, I need to work at getting readings in NYC and Boston and Seattle and Portland. But hey, if you want me to come to your town, just give a holler!

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Waiting for a new supply of books so I can send more out, so if you're expecting one from me, don't worry, I haven't forgotten!
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In the meantime, I sent out the first Hue and Cry manuscript this morning. I liked that.

Back in the saddle, more or less

2010-06-10T13:49:00.000-07:00

So we are back from Paris. Yes, it was wonderful. All the time I took reviewing and updating my French paid off. For the most part, I could partake in conversation and make myself understood. When I was tired, hurried, or hassled, my skills fell off. But for the most part, I did well.

We managed to do almost everything we needed to do and most of what we wanted to do. And the weather was mostly good.

I did take the computer but was very far away from personal and public realities for all ten days. I did not pay much attention to the news; I did not think about marketing my book. I didn't really write anything either — there wasn't time — although I did take notes for a new poem.

I was kind of hoping my box of books would be waiting here for me, but it's not. It should be here within a day or two. So the next thing I have to do is send out books to people on my acknowledgment page and give a price to other people who want to order through me because they want my signature. (I only get 20 free books and will have to pay shipping, so I can't give the book to everyone for free.)

I have lined up two readings in L.A. (fairly far into the future) and two in the Bay Area. I need to get more happening here, preferably in July or August, and I would really like to do readings in the NYC area (October is best), in Boston, and in Portland and Seattle. If you are reading in one of those places and think I might share billing, let me know. I will be eternally grateful.

I came home to a poem accepted by Harvard Review. That was heartwarming. I would just love to bury myself in the Hue and Cry manuscript and get it ready to send out. It's already almost there.

Oh, the photo (John's shot) is from Au Lapin Agile, the bar where Picasso et al. hung out in Montmartre.

Getting close

2010-05-12T17:42:00.000-07:00

I heard from my publisher that he has a copy of my book. I will see it tomorrow. I'm excited … and scared. I don't know quite what I'm scared for or of, but I'm scared.

But you know, I want to be done with this. After I get back from Paris, I'm going to start re-working Book Next. I don't have to call it Book Next, because I have a title: Hue and Cry.

Rilke pep talk

2010-05-10T14:03:00.000-07:00

Will get around (soon) to posting about my trip to LA and any news about upcoming readings. But in the meantime … the following advice from Rilke was posted on Facebook by the awesome Cheryl Strayed. I think I needed to read this right now. And maybe often.

Your work needs to be independent of others' work.
You must not compare yourself to others.
No one can help you. You have to help yourself.
Criticism leads to misunderstandings and defeatism.
Work from necessity and your compulsion to do it.
Work on what you know and what you are sure you love.
Don't observe yourself too closely, just let it happen.
Don't let yourself be controlled by too much irony.
Live in and love the activity of your work.
Be free of thoughts of sin, guilt and misgiving.
Be touched by the beautiful anxiety of life.
Be patient with the unresolved in your heart.
Try to be in love with the questions themselves.
Love your solitude and try to sing with its pain.
Be gentle to all of those who stay behind.
Your inner self is worth your entire concentration.
Allow your art to make extraordinary demands on you.
Bear your sadness with greater trust than your joy.
Do not persecute yourself with how things are going.
It's good to be solitary, because solitude is difficult.
It's good to love, because love is difficult.
You are not a prisoner of anything or anyone.

—Rilke

Postcards: ✓

2010-04-30T21:32:00.000-07:00

I'm not exactly sure of the logic behind it, but I had postcards printed. Front has a picture of the book cover, back has part of one blurb and ordering info for bookstores. Since this is a piece of paper, a hard copy, and will be a leave-behind for bookstores, I did not put much in the way of online ordering (except for my publisher's website and this blog and my email). Tomorrow, I hope to leave a stack in local independent bookstores and, if the appropriate people are approachable, try and get a reading here and there. I don't think it will be easy, but if you have a better way, let me know!

Some small progress

2010-04-28T17:49:00.000-07:00

Yessirree, we're getting there. Just seventeen days to official publication, and I'm finally getting some momentum. Today I sent my publisher a corrected proof with only two tiny annoying not-really-errors (which I almost decided to skip, but then changed my mind). I'm sure there will be other errors I don't find. That's the way it is when humans do things.

But I've made my Facebook page. And a postcard with ordering information will be ready for me to pick up on Friday. Starting Saturday, I'm visiting Bay Area bookstores in hopes of lining up readings or at least finding out whom to talk to about such. I'm flying down to L.A. next week (got a $85 round trip — including taxes — flight). My sister has offered to shuttle me to bookstores there for the same purpose.

John and I are discussing a book launch party in a local coffeehouse. I admit I didn't want to have to do this; I wanted it to just happen. But this book hasn't been like that. It needs me to make things happen.

In other news: we've rescheduled the trip to Paris that the volcano cancelled. We're taking off May 26 now, though the question of who will mind the dog is not yet answered. Hard to concentrate on Paris when I'm launching the book. Hard to launch the book when I want to put energy toward being ready for Paris. But somehow it will all come together.

Coming soon …

2010-04-24T18:10:00.000-07:00

Time for a new post

2010-04-13T13:54:00.000-07:00

… though I can't say I have much poetry news. I've been consoling myself over not having gone to AWP with the thought that we're going to Paris. Yes, indeedy, and we leave in three days. I'm totally freaking, though. Even though I've shopped 'till I dropped, arranged for a dogsitter, contacted my bank, learned how to turn off data on my iPhone, downloaded podcasts (and even Kindle for the Mac), and been practicing my French for months, I'm still freaking. I think I'm nervous that it won't turn out to be every little thing I want it to be. I'm worried that the four pair of shoes I'm taking for 10 days won't be the right shoes. I'm not even allowing myself to think of the money we're spending. We're going to Paris! I won't say how long it's been since I've gone to Paris, but let's just say that last time I went to Paris, my parents were paying!

Meantime, I'm awaiting the imminent publication of my book. Well, if not imminent, forthcoming. Only one reading locked in so far, and that's in September (Pegasus Books, Berkeley, 9/18, mes fans). Still waiting to hear from a few others, but I haven't really gotten out there asking. In May, I will be going down to L.A. and touring the bookstores with my sister. I hope to have, if not the book, by then, or a review copy, at least a postcard with ISBN and release date. I need to make an attempt to visit the Seattle/Portland areas. And then there's NYC. I'd like to arrange readings at any friendly bookstores in NYC around October 8 and maybe a few readings in Boston before or after that. Leads, clues, warnings, advice — all welcome.

No Foolin'

2010-04-01T15:44:00.000-07:00

It's been two months since I was laid off, and I have not gotten very far. The blog is still rudimentary, the thoughts in my head about how to proceed with it and with debuting my book are still hazy. Sure, I've had a rather momentous birthday, and we've been getting ready to go away (later this month). But why is it so hard to organize my thoughts? Perhaps I'm used to working on deadline, and my publisher (whose computer died, last month, among other things) has yet to give me any real date for when I'll see my book. I'm working on a new computer too. And I'm sure there are other psychological reasons why the actuality of my book eludes me.

Well, I've seen the third proof today and will send it back to my publisher tomorrow. I'd like to get a mockup of my cover, the ISBN, and a date, and I'll make a postcard up to send to anyone I've ever met — and maybe a few people I haven't met.

Meanwhile, anyone who has any tips on how to customize this blog, let me know. Right now I'm wishing I left well enough alone.

Blackbird = Phoenix?

2010-03-12T19:44:00.000-08:00

Perhaps that post title is a tad grandiose? Yet I have spring/renewal/rebirth or at least getting over this cold on my mind. I haven't been outside in two days and outside still seems a very far place to go. Yet, I'm a gonna make it, as the old widow at the bottom of the hill says every time I ask how's she doing. She's got her cataracts removed and a wig on her head, and it doesn't really matter how old she actually is.

Today I bought Bento, a database application to use with my new MacBook. My version of Filemaker Pro (5.5!) wasn't working very well with Snow Leopard, spinning beachballs with the slightest change and crashing without warning. I've imported all my old po biz submission data (support wasn't very helpful, butI figured it out), and I'm very happy with it.

I'm planning to create a database for marketing the new book. I'll put all the contacts people give me in there. (Call X in Y city at Z bookstore) and hopefully schedule reading events. I can import contacts to send out email reminders too.

Going Solo

2010-03-08T21:23:00.000-08:00

When I started this blog (back in '05?), my idea was to have a shared podium for members of the poetry group 13 Ways. For a while, I was joined here by Robert Thomas, very occasionally by others in the group. But neither Robert nor anyone else is really interested in keeping this going. I'm not sure how much I'm interested in keeping it going. Like many others, I've found the drive-by posts on Facebook to be more than enough.

Recently, Blogger had me migrate my site so that I no longer publish it through FTP with the website 13 Ways. And so it seems a good time to make a break from the past. (Or as good a time as any.) I'm going to make this a solo blog, for now, on the subject of poetry and being a poet in the world and whatever else comes up. (The website www.13ways.org, which I mean to entirely revamp as well, will continue to be about the group and the individual poets in it.)

So we'll see. I hope you will come here and comment and make this a conversation, or it's going to get very quiet. As I said recently, I'd like to collect some good ideas for marketing poetry books, as a start. ( I will attempt to be a better conversationalist too.)

That's enough for now, intent and direction. I think I'm coming down with something, so that's as ambitious as I want to be at the moment. Will turn in and read some of the 22 books beside my bed.

This blog has moved

2010-03-07T12:32:00.001-08:00

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Now what?

2010-02-08T15:28:00.000-08:00

It's a long time since I've posted, though I'm not much convinced that anyone cares. Nevertheless, I have plenty of time now that I'm unemployed, so methinks I will get back into the habit.

I'd like to start a discussion about marketing one's poetry books in this age of small presses and Print on Demand (POD). I've been researching the issue and welcome your first-person experiences.

No one is under the illusion that the publication of a book of poetry is going to result in fame, fortune, best-sellerdom, or even a ripple in the zeitgeist. Nevertheless, making some personal effort to stir the waters is bound to be better than nothing, as far as getting the book out there. And we all want the book out there, don't we?

Sure, this post and any comments that ensue will be self-serving, as my book, Conjugated Visits, will be out soon. But there's no reason why what I learn can't also serve you. In a sense, we're all in this together.

My newest news

2009-11-19T18:47:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I was notified that I won a prize. It's the 9th annual Erskine J. Poetry Prize from Smartish Pace. I get $200 along with publication of my poem.

Yeah, it's only $200 (and the funny part is, I can't even remember entering this competition—I'm not exactly spending money these days; I can't) but it's very nice. It's especially meaningful because, as some of you know, I won second prize at the Nimrod and National Writers Union, been finalist at Discovery/Nation and numerous manuscript competitions, including the National Poetry Series, but I've never actually won anything — unless you count first prize for fifth-grade girls in the Yonkers science fair. So, yay me!

Other than that, well, I had plenty to say until now, but I can't remember what was so important. John is out at some Opera Guild cocktail party or some such thing but will be back soon. I am thawing out from my walk with the dog (okay, it was actually 52°, but I'm sensitive to cold) with a large glass of Charles Shaw cabernet. There are sweet potatoes roasting in the kitchen.

A Rationale

2009-10-16T19:49:00.000-07:00

I needed to provide a writing sample today for a possible job. Boy do I hate that, having to prove myself. Well, I came across this, and I like it. I needed to update it, but I thought I would post it here. It concerns my book that is due to be published this spring with Dream Horse Press.

Conjugated Visits is a book of poems that, for the most part, is concerned with passion and point of view, with relationships that sometimes work and sometimes do not, between partners, among family members, among strangers, in a world that is not always face forward and can’t be taken at face value.

I group poems that seem to belong together. Although this statement is a “rationale,” it’s not always a rational thing; sometimes it’s intuitive. Sometimes the poems in a group have similar themes or ideas, are involved in one or another of my preoccupations. Sometimes they share mood or attitude. On the other hand, sometimes they work to contrast with others or another, a palate refresher, so to speak.

I’m aware that one is supposed to start out strong and end with a bang. I’m not sure of my bang ending. I put what you might call my Yonkers poems in the middle because I’m trying to work against the cliché of chronology.

Conjugated Visits

Conjugated Visits (the section) begins with “Conjugated Visits” because I think this poem sets up the first section and the book well. This poem goes from I to you to she to he to they and then broadens out, and I think that sets up a workable strategy. It’s a strong poem that was published in both Field and on Poetry Daily.

The second poem in this section (“Sonhar”) takes the “I” a bit further. (I’d like to state at this point that all “I” poems in the manuscript and, indeed, all poems that seem personal are fictional, not autobiographical. They may partake of personal experience, but move beyond those experiences, I hope, and are true to the experience of the poem, not to “what actually happened.”)

The next poem in the first section is “Demimonde,” and I like a lot about it although I�Proxy-Connection: keep-alive
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9m not sure that it was ever 100 percent successful. It sets up a story about a fictional world from the poet’s point of view, and it’s supposed to sound very “noir.” This was the title poem of the manuscript for years, but I no longer think it works as a title. Still, the relationship implied in the poem — or the possibility of the connection between the woman and the man in the poem together with the weather connection, well, I think that follows well from the poems that precede it.

Darkness Visible

Darkness Visible is a section of very dark days and includes “Was You Ever Bit By A Dead Bee,” the pet quip of the Walter Brennan drunk character in To Have or Have Not. The section ends with the poem, “Darkness Visible,” whose title comes from Milton and which addresses Johnny Cash.

ShBoom

In the ShBoom section, which I think of as sort of “pop,” we segue into the “Lorraine Asks” poem, which, in the guise of a casual discussion, brings up “the one thing they will hold over you.” In Orwell’s 1984, Big Brother knew the one thing that you feared most. I think loving is by far more dangerous — outright scary — than being loved. You are just never the same after opening yourself up to loving in this way.

The next poem, the title poem of this section is “ShBoom.” It’s kind of a memory piece, an imagistic poem about summer in Yonkers, just a picture of the way it was. The song “Life Could be a Dream,” was both a pop song and something my mother used to say, in regard to how fast life passes. The sounds, my sister’s naked dancing, the fireflies, the women doing dishes at night, the piccolo (I used to play) — are all very dreamlike.

The next one, “Back in Yonkers,” is also dreamlike, but pretty graphic. It’s meant to be more than a confession. It’s meant to restate that you can’t go home again, and if you do, you’re not the same person who left. It’s also meant to show what Yonkers was like during a certain era. It’s written in Yonkers-speak.

Another poem in this section is “Gal Friday.” Much of this section is involved with old ideas about what it meant to be a woman. This poem hearkens back to the time when classified ads in newspapers were divided into positions for men and jobs for women. A Gal Friday was the name of the job whose responsibilities included doing whatever was necessary to please the (male) management. Both acquiescing and refusing were equally demoralizing.

Bequest

The ten poems of Bequest are all about death. It’s hard to explain why I think poems about death belong in a book about relationships — maybe because we all have to deal with it some day — and not just our own death, but our loved ones’ deaths too.

Hue and Cry

The final section is both more “political” — though I’m not sure what I mean by that — and less logically or narratively inclined, so more experimental. “Five Days on Twenty” is about working on the 20th floor of an office building in Oakland, but the speaker, rather than being removed from the surrounding environment, is overly affected by that environment. Maybe she is on her way to a breakdown.

For “Hue and Cry,” I borrowed the beginnings of lines from a poem I encountered in APR. I just wanted to do what I could, sacrificing semantics to syntax, although I love the meanings that happened as I continued. I really enjoyed the variations-on-a-theme aspect of this — both the writing and the result.

The poem that follows is “Night Vision.” It’s a rebellion against high tech, not really any specific person or product, more a rejection of the idea that the next new thing is going to perfect us. It’s somewhat antagonistic toward a male vision of things, I suppose. In many ways, it is sound driven. This could be considered a bad thing by some.

The penultimate poem in the book is “Fraught With Danger.” The image this poem begins with is conception. This poem is about entropy, about things falling apart.

The last poem in the book is “As It Never Was,” which comes from a dream I had about living in the rhythms of the seasons, in a more traditional way of life. It feels like an ending.

Update on update

2009-10-02T17:09:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to me! Today's my 33rd wedding anniversary, as I've plastered all over Facebook. Well, maybe I'm overdoing it, but whoever heard of anyone being married this long! :]

I'm working full time down at NASA Ames until the third week of October, then going half time. Though we almost left The City in terror (on the theory that it's cheaper to live anywhere but here), we're going to stick it out after all, cutting back on EVERYTHING. Truth is, I'm almost looking forward to my new schedule. I will only have to drive down to Moffett Field two days a week! Woohoo!

'Course it will be great if some contract work happens (especially telecommuting). My resumé has been well received, but who's hiring? But won't it be great to have more writing time? I need a lot of time by myself to write. Though I can scribble bits and pieces on the go, I need to be not distracted to make something of it, and lately, I'm just exhausted.

So we'll see.
---------------------
Also, I love fall, its negative capabilities, the putting away of light things. Besides, the weather is spectacular: crystalline days, luminous nights. If you (whoever, wherever you are), ever plan to visit Northern California, by golly, now is the time to do it!

Big Decisions

2009-09-16T20:16:00.000-07:00

I don't know what to do. Should we, in the space of a month, sell our house, move an hour north to a tiny but cute place in Sonoma County? I'm not kidding. My job is going to (maybe) 50%, and John's work is here and there, dribs and drabs. In order to retain that 50% and the (very expensive) health care that comes with it, I will have to commute an extra hour and a quarter. This will only be two days a week, for now, but I don't know how long now will be. And if work expands? How would I deal with a three day commute schedule of that nature?

I'm trying to get other work, of course. I get very positive responses to my resumé.

We could delay the decision, but the pristine little cottage could go. And October is the prime month to sell a house in San Francisco. We have lived in our house almost 21 years.

Any thoughts? My dear sweet friend and manager says not to do anything hasty, and I promised her I wouldn't. But then, I don't know.

A drag

2009-09-11T22:02:00.000-07:00

It's always an exercise in some sort of faith to write here. I imagine it's like praying for those who pray, the need to believe that there is something out there. Partly that's the reason I write here so rarely. Also because this was supposed to be a team blog, for the poetry group, and it's so obviously not. So on top of wondering if anyone is actually reading this, I feel guilty that what they (you) are reading is just about me.

But the truth is, I'm pretty scared. My job is being cut back to 50%, even though they love me there. Work comes in dribs and drabs for John. Of course things could change. We're scrambling. I don't want to be one of those sad woe-is-me stories. I want to be a happy ending.

Not Business as Usual

2009-08-26T16:07:00.000-07:00

Looks like life is throwing me another curve. Probably, in a little more than a month, I will have 25% of my job. That's all the money they're allotting for overhead in the Division, and writing and editing are overhead. I know it's not personal — I do my job really well, and everyone seems to like me — and need me. They just don't want to pay for it!

We have already downsized at home, closed the studio. But now the Healthcare discussion becomes personal. John is self-employed. How will we pay for health insurance? COBRA is expensive!

I can't really wrap my head around this yet. I'm still hoping for miracles. If you've got any great ideas, let me know.
_____________________________
UPDATE
Probably will not have 25% of a job, whatever that is. Probably will have all (less likely) or none (more likely). No one really believes this, let alone me. Everyone continues to give me work. I continue to do it. We talk future -- later and so forth. Magic? or denial.

C'est la Vie

2009-08-11T12:22:00.000-07:00

My claim to fame denied again — and that's all that I will say about that. It's okay, although the visions of glory were entertaining, on occasion. Life goes on.

But apologies for not posting more frequently. It was hard for me to write around the elephant in my brain/room.

Not much of a summer here, but that's the way it is too. In the City, the sun comes out briefly, and just when you think you could seriously get used to it, it's gone.

Work goes on. I'm lucky to have a job, everyone says. And I'm making tremendous progress in my French, which I study during the commute. Paris, here I come (springtime in, depending on work and AWP, if I go).

Here's some news: the poetry group 13 Ways will be reading at the Madrone Lounge in San Francisco on September 20. More info as the date nears.

Wednesday, August 12, is the Perseid meteor shower. It's not going to be too spectacular this year, due to moonlight, but we're trying to find a fog-minimal, city-light-free spot to view it. Years ago, when the boy was small, we would drive from Camp Mather and throw the old Army blankets down on the still-warm concrete of the Hetch Hetchy dam and watch the show.

Bit of an update

2009-06-07T18:34:00.000-07:00

I apologize for the dearth of posts these days. It would seem to be a good thing — that life is too busy to take the time to talk about it -- but most of the busy-ness is just the business of living, working, driving to work and back home and staying awake, evenings and weekends busy with meals, laundry, po biz, and so forth. Rarely do I get the luxury to just read or write. Sometimes I write in my sleep, restlessly composing, waking up so tired I can hardly drag through the day.

Work has fallen off for John, as it usually does during periods of economic difficulty. Who wants to pay for photography when they can have their brother-in-law take the picture? Someone actually called John the other day, balking at his day fee and threatening to go to Sears. John tried to explain that they wouldn't get the same quality from Sears. I told him to just tell the caller to hold up their cell phone and smile. Sure. Why not? Meantime, we've closed the photo studio and saved 2K a month. John is attempting to work from home, his workstation set up in the dark basement!

And I've got too much work at work, while the management encourages us to take unpaid vacation. Facebook friends in academia talk about summer vacation. We contemplate the San Francisco summer — unrelenting fog. For that reason alone (well, aside from a paycheck), I don't mind the long commute south each morning. At least I see sun, smell the jasmine blooming outside the office.

We are set to go away for four days next week, however, for John's mom's 90th birthday. There will be a big party in the Boston area, relatives flying in from Ireland and all. Except the young man who was supposed to dogsit has bailed. Our dog is 14 years old, sweet and delicate, and John and I baby her night and day. Greta is on painkillers, can't do stairs or hills (and we live on a 14° hill), and needs to be assisted in and out of a car. So I'm trying not to panic as we contact everyone we know, hoping that someone will want to stay here for four days, high on a hill in San Francisco, with a sweet little mutt.

This morning, yoga class (with a substitute) was cancelled. I tried to do yoga at home (and did eventually), but first I had to deal with downward facing dog — actually more like dog in relaxation pose. Cellphone picture below.

Now you see why I don't post more often. Maybe I will have something interesting to say sometime soon.

Some News

2009-04-27T17:13:00.000-07:00

Some news has been brewing for some time. I've been shy about hinting, but today the announcement has been made. My book, finalist yet again, has been selected for publication by Dream Horse Press. I'm happy, feel they will do well by my book, as well as a (very) small press can do, and I'm happy to save those godawful contest fees for a while. (Though actually, I have another --new-- book -- that still needs work, waiting in the wings, though I have already sent it to two places.) But Conjugated Visits, formerly known as Demimonde, which will be published by Dream Horse Press in 2010, is my first, for a long time my only baby, and I feel funny, no longer wondering and worrying about its future.

Not counting putting together the final manuscript, deciding on a photo for the cover, and then learning all that publicity stuff, which I've never had to pay attention to.

Shoulda, woulda, coulda

2009-03-17T16:37:00.000-07:00

I miss Fella!

I meant to post something after leaving VCCA that summed up my experience there -- a wonderful place -- fun, pretty, inspiring, and the only time in my life that I've had 18 days (minus the travel and acculturation time) to just write. I left on a high after a ten-minute reading the night before that even offset a quiet departure and a very long flight, one leg of which was between two large men who could have benefited from showers.

I miss Eduardo, my VCCA buddy. Despite his remorseless teasing, he introduced me to place and people and helped this introvert fit in. And we had a lot of fun snarking about fellow fellows, fellow poets, fellow bloggers, and whatnot late at night.

Since coming back, I've had some second thoughts about the manuscript I put together there -- although I'm still glad I did it. Being back to work has been relatively easy. My sweetie, who missed me while I was gone, has been tres sympathique. My dog has been her quirky doggie self.

I have managed in the last two months to lose my watch, break my glasses (at VCCA) and today, spill a cup of coffee on my iPhone. I don't know what all this "means" but I hope I'm done with it.

My windowbox also greeted me.

More from VCCA

2009-03-04T17:04:00.000-08:00

More from VCCA

2009-03-04T06:35:00.000-08:00

I keep on thinking I'll post the blog at night and then don't, so I'll make an attempt now. It's 9:30 in the morning and I'm eager to get to the studio and see what disaster I wreaked last night when I started reordering the new manuscript. One of the new poets here asked me the manuscripts title, and it was the first time I said it aloud, and it was weird. See, I'm too unsure of it to even post it here.

Well, as some of you already know, we had snow on Monday (?) and since then it has been melting and freezing and so forth. I've taken some pictures with my iPhone so will post them here now.

VCCA post

2009-02-23T17:29:00.000-08:00

I've been here for four days and I haven't posted -- but I've been having a great time and getting a lot done. Right now, I'm sitting around, post dinner, post ping pong, with Eduardo Corral and Deborah Ager.

I'm going to post some photos:

What's on Your Desk?

2009-01-26T17:49:00.000-08:00

Here are some of the things on my desk:

1) A glass paperweight that used to belong to my mother, weird but unique
2) No fewer than five notebook / journals hardly written in
3) Squiggly dry seaweed driftwood
4) Two pieces of other driftwood
5) Two fabric lizards, lounging
6) Files and paid bills and letters held up by a pair of spherical wooden bookends that belonged to my father.
7) A black Santa Clara pottery bowl filled with shells and stones
8) A metal candy box filled with same
9) A small black plastic dog -- were two, one has gone missing
10) A glass jar filled with batteries to be recycled
11) Stationery boxes
12) Stapler, pens, pencils, and assorted crap

If you want to enumerate what is on your desk, consider yourself tagged.

Forgot a title

2009-01-23T14:58:00.000-08:00

So much has happened in the days since my last post, but not much has happened to me. I resist posting here the same news everyone posts. And my own life is boring. So what does that leave? Good luck, every last bit of it, to our new leader. I have faith in you and know you will work hard for us.

Work has been very busy, and I struggle to stay awake on my long drive home, often waking with a jerk after I've swerved out of my lane. (Yeah, I know that's awful. I'm working on it!)

I look forward to leaving (on the red eye) for VCCA in less than a month. I've been through Virginia but never to Virginia, so I can't visualize it, don't know what to expect. I plan to shape a bunch of poems into BookNext (which also needs a real title) and make some decisions about Conjugated Visits. For two and a half weeks, I will answer only to myself.

Self Centered

2009-01-11T19:06:00.000-08:00

This post is fairly selfish. That is, it's more pertinent to myself than the rest of the group. Bear with me, please.

I'm going to VCCA in about a month's time. I'm excited about having 18 days or thereabouts to do my writing and not be required to go to work or cook or clean or socialize if I don't want to. They're giving me the residency for practically nothing, and by using my Discover card I can whittle down much of the plane fare.

But I will be missing twelve days of work that I can ill afford to miss. Other people I know who have gone hither or thither have gotten fellowships to help them cover expenses. I don't know the first thing about this -- well, I know about it but I don't know how to apply that knowledge specifically to my case.

Does anyone know of any grants or fellowships I can apply to. How do I go about doing this?

New Year's Day, Some Assembly Required, Resolutions Included

2009-01-01T15:52:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year to anyone out there reading this, though I very much wonder if anybody is. I am having a lovely afternoon after a hectic holiday. John and I are sitting in the living room. Sun is pouring in on us and on the dog, the kind of winter light that feels redemptive, perfect for the first day of the New Year. We are drinking tea and eating cheese and crackers, dried fruit and nuts, and biscotti and listening to a new Sonny Rollins CD, "Road Shows" -- thanks Robert and Cheryl!

Here are some of my New Year's resolutions, in the order that they come to me, to be refined, I'm sure:

1) (Verily paradoxical), I resolve to spend less time on the computer, more reading, exercising body and mind.
2) Get my book taken this year, and if there are no takers, take stock of its worth, whether it is meant to be or not, possibly making revolutionary changes.
3) Finish the prose memoirs (essays) that I've talked about more than written.
4) Be less of a hermit and keep in touch with those who are close to my heart but may be far away.
5) Try not to make resolutions for anyone else.
6) Try not to worry, at least late at night when I should be sleeping.

That's all for now. Namaste!

Small pleasures

2008-12-13T20:29:00.000-08:00

Nothing much happening. Our weather is cold (for us) -- in the low 40s, but despite fierce rain and wind overnight, the forecasted weekend of storm hasn't arrived -- or hasn't yet. I woke up last night when the rain stopped with the image of Pinocchio's burned feet in my mind.

John had to attend a function this afternoon and evening (an opera recital where he is exhibiting and possibly selling some of his opera portraits), and I really wasn't looking forward to the evening alone. But I took care of some errands and walked the dog and came home determined to neither do nothing nor do too much. I fed the pooch, put away groceries, poured myself a large glass of red wine. For dinner I cooked nahit (hot, dry, seasoned garbanzo beans) and winter squash, which I ate with butter, salt and pepper, and I had a piece of naan bread. I'm sure most people would think this a bizarre, disgusting dinner, and John for sure would not have approved -- nor of the fact that I ate all this walking about in the kitchen. But I found it delicious and satisfying and just right.

Then I messed around with putting together a wreath. We have a grapevine wreath that we bought decades ago, and I stick pieces of the fir tree in it (the pieces they cut off from the bottom to put the tree into the stand) and I tied on a red/green plaid ribbon from somewhere. I was listening to Garrison Keillor's show, and it was appropriately shmaltzy.

The dog is asleep on the couch. I've got a poem for tomorrow's workshop. Maybe I'll revise it another time.

Pop Quiz Answers

2008-11-30T13:20:00.000-08:00

Here are my answers to the currently circulating meme:

1. When was the last time you wrote a poem?
Yesterday afternoon.

2. What was its title?
"Robyn, Love You Buckets Miss You—Eric" -- but dunno, it might change slightly.

3. What was one image from the poem (if applicable)?
Graffiti on a lampost that marks the spot of a fatal accident.

4. Do you currently have a poem percolating in your brain?
Just the usual peat bog where who knows what is buried. I'm actually trying to write a memoir/essay.

5. If you answered "yes" to number four, what is one image from that poem?
The guiding image from the memoir/essay is EK walking around my husband's flat in nothing but bikini underwear with "Home of the Wopper" on the fly and also an Italian Beretta in a shoulder holster.

Bit to be thankful for

2008-11-26T14:40:00.000-08:00

Apparently, the Pushcart Prize has given my poem "Conjugated Visits" (published by Field and Poetry Daily) a "special mention" at the back of the book.

They publish 30 poems of the approx. 4,000 poetry nominations they get each year and give "special mention" to 30 others. And I'm there, along with John Ashbery, Jane Hirshfield, and so forth.

This makes me very happy. That, and the fact that I have been accepted to VCCA for 2 1/2 weeks in February-March.

And four days off! Four days in which I can sleep in!

Quick now, here, now, always—

2008-11-17T12:36:00.000-08:00

I really liked this piece about TS Eliot by Jeanette Winterson.

So when people say that poetry is merely a luxury for the educated middle classes, or that it shouldn't be read much at school because it is irrelevant, or any of the strange and stupid things that are said about poetry and its place in our lives, I suspect that the people doing the saying have had things pretty easy. A tough life needs a tough language - and that is what poetry is. That is what literature offers - a language powerful enough to say how it is.

Let's not confuse this with realism. The power does not lie directly with the choice of subject or its social relevance - if it did, then everything not about our own contemporary situation would be academic to us, and all the art of the past would be a mental museum. Art lasts because it gives us a language for our inner reality, and that is not a private hieroglyph; it is a connection across time to all those others who have suffered and failed, found happiness, lost it, faced death, ruin, struggled, survived, known the night-hours of inconsolable pain.

Also, couldn't agree more with Cathy Park Hong of Harriet Blog about serious unproductivity during the days (weeks, months) leading up to the election.

Gray Saturday

2008-11-08T10:06:00.000-08:00

It's a quiet, gray day here. Although I hear City College's marching band playing, it looks like rain. John has already gone downtown to work on a reshoot and won't be back until maybe 5:00. Greta is patiently waiting for me to finish with this post and take her for a walk. (Would be good idea to get out there before the rain starts.)

The house is a bit worse for wear -- everything stopped this week as we obsessed over the election. Now, change will come in Washington, but I still better wash the kitchen floor!

In the office, I have papers spread all over the floor. I'm going through my big wicker picnic basket full of old poems, printouts, old versions of my manuscript. I don't really know what I'm looking for.

One Day

2008-11-03T21:53:00.000-08:00

After all this time. One day.

Three More Days

2008-11-01T19:36:00.000-07:00

I am obsessed. I can't think of anything else except the election -- even though John and I already voted today. We stood in the rain and we voted early. For Obama, of course. Is there any doubt? And against California Proposition 8 and against Proposition 4. Talk about the audacity of hope. If President Obama can accomplish even a small fraction of what this country needs, it will be wonderful. It will be a start.

The thing is: I had been obsessed with my manuscript, how close it's come so many times, the totally specious reasons for which it has been rejected, the less worthy books that have been published… But this election, this campaign has really made me understand how trivial my concerns about the manuscript are in comparison -- in comparison with the bigger cause that has involved us.

It's Saturday night and it's raining. I've been soaked twice today. John is out finishing some prints he owes people. I've had a large glass of red wine, so forgive me. The wine: free, Argentinean, "tannat," 2005 vintage. John is a photographer -- you know, if he shoots it, we drink it.

So, we're going to win, aren't we? In 1968, when I graduated high school, I was named "most idealistic." But even I could not have imagined the possibility of a win on Tuesday. Not just a win -- a landslide.

Please.

This ain't no fooling around…

2008-10-07T09:54:00.000-07:00

This ain't no party, this ain't no disco, it's work I'm posting from -- but I don't want to come down yet from the high of last night's concert -- David Byrne at Davies Hall in San Francisco. (And speaking of high, though we weren't partaking, it seems that Davies Hall ushers are not quite used to doing liquor-and-other-assorted-other-stuff searches, because, well, let's just say that this was not your typical Symphony crowd). But it was an awesome concert -- the new stuff ("Everything That Happens Will Happen Today" music by Brian Eno, lyrics by Byrne) and the old Talking Heads stuff.

We had good seats -- second tier, but right in front with a clear view to the stage. And the acoustics were terrific. Byrne, his backup band, backup singers, and three athletic quirky dancers were all wearing white. The show was as good as the music. There were two encores, standing ovations, and at the end of the second encore, Byrne invited the "San Francisco Marching Band" -- maybe they were leftover from the Love Parade the last week? -- to come to the stage and then the Byrne band joined them (that's what this picture captures, though it doesn't really capture anything, but you can see the excitement) for the finale of "Burning Down the House."

Roses on a rainy day

2008-10-04T08:32:00.000-07:00

It rained last night here. First rain since, what, April? I lay in bed trying to figure out what the noise was.

Not much news in this corner lately, but I'm embarrassed by the dearth of posts in this blog. I hardly know what the point is, but anyway, today I'll post. It gives me the opportunity to show off my beautiful roses. They've opened out since Thursday, and their colors are the whole spectrum of apricot, from pink and creamy to nearly orange to hints of brown, like a sunset in a flower. This picture doesn't do any justice -- but there's only one photographer in this family and right now, he's still asleep.

We didn't do much for our anniversary (32!), but then we're going out on Monday to hear David Byrne and Brian Eno at Symphony Hall, and that was a bit of a splurge, so that will be enough. Besides, there was all that other entertainment on Thursday. (But I'm telling you, I'm going to bite my fingernails entirely off before this election's over.)

And I'm already biting them for other reasons. But I wasn't going to get into that again, until/when/if.

Dream job

2008-09-09T21:23:00.000-07:00

New Pages has posted the following announcement
ZYZZYVA Seeks a New Editor
In the Editor's Note of the most recent ZYZZYVA, Howard Junker announces his intent to retire from the magazine, which is now seeking his successor, someone who "will have to be different, will have to take a new direction, because the times have changed." The informal job description Junker gives draws upon a response he once gave to a Paris Review Questionnaire about "the key ingredients needed to keep a literary magazine afloat." Junker writes: "Taking its editor George Plimpton as my model, I declared: An independent income is the basic flotation device. Having the office in the editor's basement reduces rent and the editor's commute. Also helpful because, even if the budget remains modest, attracting money is key: good looks, charm, guts, a thick skin, a sense of humor, a good work ethic, luck, and the ability to spot and nurture talent." Sound like anybody you know? If so, Junker closes his editorial: "If you have someone in mind, please let me know.

Ah yes, that would be cool. But an independent income? Uh, no.

In other news: nice party at work today for two people who just became citizens and also for one who was getting married. He had lived 15 years with his boyfriend and they are getting married this weekend. Very cool celebration -- about a dozen pizzas, three cakes, ice cream, champagne. I work in a cool place.

Not what it was quacked up to be

2008-09-05T19:38:00.000-07:00

On Tuesday, we're getting the 78 year old furnace in our house replaced with a more energy-efficient one. The following phone call really happened: (John is a photographer and has done a lot of weird jobs in his time -- or that's his excuse.)

Woman: I'm calling to remind you of the job on Monday.
John: Uh, could you remind me what job this is?
Woman: You know, the ducks in the basement.
John: Ducks in the basement?
Woman: Yeah, the ducks?
John: Can you give me a few more details?
Woman: You know, the asbestos removal? The ducts?
John: Oh, the ducts!

Staring into the sun at whales

2008-08-31T13:01:00.000-07:00

Yesterday evening we droveagain to Funston, the cliffs overlooking the Pacific that are about 10 minutes away from our house, with the dog. I said, offhand, that since the fog was gone, it would be nice to see the sunset and whales. It's amazing how fast you can get used to something extraordinary!

Well, they were out there again! Lest you think I'm making this up or having flashbacks to an earlier more innocent time, here's corroboration.

You probably associate whale watching with wind and cold and sea spray and possibly getting seasick. Sitting on a nice warm sand dune with your dog beside you is a much more fun way to watch whales. And hang gliders. And pelicans.

View from here ....

2008-08-27T13:04:00.000-07:00

I feel thoroughly put down and bested by the I-Can-Do-Anything-You-Can Do-Better barrage. I'm so not good at debate. It shoots me right back into my childhood and my father and brother ganging up to belittle me and make me unnerved by calling me "emotional."

All I wanted to say was don't blame the victim in the Cider Press thing -- and sure, she should have been more careful early on, but hey, does this mean no competitions are legitimate? Yeah, they cost money (so do a good many of the "open" submissions -- and there are fewer and fewer of them, even so), but when people pay $4 for a Starbucks, is a $20 fee for a book contest so awful? I don't buy Starbucks and I brown-bag my lunch. So I enter some competitions -- not every damn one, but some.

All I said is self publishing smacks of desperation -- to me, for me. Yeah, a lot of crap gets published every which way, no argument there.

I'd like to publish a magazine, maybe, someday. But right now I spend my day working and driving to work. There's not a lot of time left for being human, let alone writing. That said, I'd better get back to my work.

Thar She Blows!

2008-08-24T16:31:00.000-07:00

Whales! We were out at Funston with poochie, and there — so close you could almost touch 'em — were whales! Lots of 'em, breaching and blowing. We watched for about an hour. It was hard to tear ourselves away!

We've never seen whales from there or anywhere in San Francisco. We've recently seen dolphins from there, but these were definitely whales (John carries his binoculars, of course.) And it's not even migratory season.

I was pretty depressed this morning about stuff, but this helped take me out of myself.

Whoo-hoo! Yowza! Hurray!

2008-08-22T15:30:00.000-07:00

Last night was the second opening of John's photography show, of characters in the San Francisco Opera. Last week was for the Bravo Club only; this week for everyone else. So the show has been up for eight (count 'em) days -- and he has sold eight prints! If you don't know how amazing that is, let me tell you: it is very amazing! But everyone has loved the work!

John has worked so long and hard for this, and I'm so happy for my sweetie! If you're in the neighborhood (Gallery 645, at Michael Thompson Framing, 647 & 645 7th Street, San Francisco CA, 94103), go see it! It will be up until September 25.

It's Only Rock n' Roll ...

2008-08-13T11:32:00.000-07:00

... but I like it! In fact, I loved it, really, the Rolling Stones move, "Shine A Light" that I saw last night on DVD. I was dancing around the living room, despite the fact that it embarrassed John and the dog. I want to see it again!

But I was up too late on a work day, and now I'm fighting off sleep.

Works for me

2008-08-05T20:14:00.000-07:00

Greg and Leslie have written about their poetry "rules." I liked reading theirs. I'm not sure I really have rules, though I can generalize, somewhat, about what works or doesn't work for me.

First: endings. I rarely, if ever, know where a poem will end, which may be why so many of my poems end not with bangs but whimpers. Sometimes they don't end as much as they stop. But I confess that I think that's okay. If, in a sense, my poem takes the reader somewhere, I prefer not to announce that we've arrived.

Sound is important to me, as I've said here before. And texture. I like to use the syntax of the English sentence, working with breath and line endings for tension. So, an easy, colloquial speech, but not flatness. A mix of diction -- good crunchy words, but not arcane or archaic usage.

I lean to the lyric. Narrative elements are often present, but in most poems, they are subjugated to the lyrical impulse. The experience or the experiment is more important than the story.

I am very much one of the humankind of whom Eliot noted cannot bear too much reality.

Red-Headed Stepchild Endorses Tuscan Whole Milk

2008-07-23T15:11:00.000-07:00

So yeah, I'm still in a friggin' bad mood, but this website is a hoot. Okay, it's two years old and probably everybody has seen it already. Well, it made me laugh, and that's something.

Highs and Lows

2008-07-23T10:56:00.000-07:00

It was cold as usual, this morning, in the Ingleside neighborhood of San Francisco, but the sun was shining, and Greta was pretty perky, the Rimadyl having worked its medicine on her hips. I plugged into my iPhone (my son's gift for last Xmas, birthday, and mother's day). I'm still learning how to use it.

I've got Pandora Radio, a free app that transmits your own personal mix of music -- I mean it comes up with a steady stream of songs that it thinks you will like after you give it a few indications as to your faves. I had some reservations about joining the white earbud pack -- after all, I wouldn't be able to hear the birds, not to mention the cars that were going to run us over. But pretty soon, I was bopping down the street to Dylan and Joe Lovano and Sonny Rollins and Johnny Cash and The Who and …

But I turned a corner and lost the connection. So I checked my email instead. Seventy-five new messages since yesterday, including another rejection.

So what is it with my karma lately? I've been on a bad luck streak, drought, jinx, whatever for so long I want to scream and smash things, maybe myself included. People used to like my poems. Have I started writing bad poems? I never was Miss Popularity, but is the muse just not into me? Is it because I'm not young or not MFA'd or "the red-headed stepchild" as I read on somebody's blog this morning?

Another request

2008-07-16T20:42:00.000-07:00

And again, it's not for me. They're putting together a catalog for John's gallery show (in less than a month) of those great opera portraits (see below). They need some words, a quote, something in front of the catalog. I would love him to use Matthews's "Night at the Opera," because I love that poem and I love Matthews. But I wonder if it's right-- its point being about the perfect note and John's shots are about costume and character. However, it's all opera. I dunno. What do you think?

Or do you have anything to suggest? Naturally I'd rather he used a poem -- not just some quote about opera. Let us know what you think.

Meantime my book is being considered somewhere. I get sick to my stomach when I think about it, I'm so anxious. Probably will bomb out once again.

Looking for Super Men

2008-07-11T14:28:00.000-07:00

Not what you think! My husband, a super man for sure, sent me this, from the SF Opera. FWIW, it takes a real time commitment, but they seem to have a lot of fun.

SUPERNUMERARY CASTING CALL
July 22, 2008 from 6:30pm – 8:30 p.m.
Zellerbach B Rehearsal Hall
Located at the corner of Hayes and Franklin Streets in San Francisco CASTING MEN ONLY FOR THE 2008 – 2009 SEASON
We are looking for men of all ages to be supernumeraries. Referred to as “supers,” these are the people who volunteer their time in non-speaking roles on stage. While non-speaking and non-singing and often seen in crowd scenes, as soldiers, or in a variety of service roles such as maids, butlers, and ladies-in-waiting, they are essential to the production.
Requirements:
• Flexible schedule – planned rehearsals change frequently and often take place during daytime working hours
• Acting/performing arts experience preferred but not essential
• Children under age 18 require work permit

If you are interested in auditioning, please call 415-565-3200 and leave your name and phone number. You will not receive a return phone call unless there is some change to the audition schedule.
Please be aware that super roles are limited and are cast at the discretion of the stage directors. San Francisco Opera will not be able to use all people who apply.
Time commitment varies per production.

Operas in the 2008 Season with available male super roles include:

Simon Boccanegra
Die Tote Stadt
Idomeneo
Boris Godunov
The Elixir of Love
La Boheme

Got my goat(s)

2008-06-23T13:04:00.000-07:00

So there I was, walking Greta Garbo near the old reservoir by City College, and lo and behold! Goats. I attempted a cameraphone pic, but as I'm extremely stupid at such things, I assumed it didn't work. But I guess I got something.

Nice weekend. Did some po biz, went to dinner at friends' up in San Anselmo, worked in the garden.

Fog is back.

Request

2008-06-13T10:30:00.000-07:00

Back from the park and ready to get to work (despite little glitch in Internet connection, now resolved.) Oh, but I'm feeling good, having got a full 8 hours of sleep. Yes!

Sun is fighting to break through the fog this morning, but earlier, at Pine Lake, the mist was rising from the lake. A cormorant glided toward the edge and disappeared. A large turtle swam just under the surface. Later, the cormorant could be seen drying its wings, as is its wont, on the float in the middle of the lake.

Yesterday, I wanted to post about all the metaphors newscasters (on NPR) use to discuss the news: the fire metastasized. There was a seismic shift in public opinion. I never got around to post yesterday and have now forgotten the other examples I heard. Feel free to add others you've heard in a comment.

I know the posts have been few and far between on this blog of late. Robert has been busy moving and I have just been busy. (And no one else in the group seems to want to post.)

But I have a favor to ask the blogosphere. John (husband) attended a portfolio review (photography) in Santa Fe last week: big deal juried conference. Despite the fact that he was maybe the oldest there and everyone else seemed to know one another from graduate school, he, or rather, his work, got a fantastic reception. A major SF gallery is interested, and a well-known New York (name withheld) art publisher wants to do his book. This book will be his photos of principals, chorus, and supernumeraries in the SF Opera, in costume and in character. But he needs someone to write text to accompany the photos. I know zilch about opera, and the publisher wants someone, preferably, not only knowledgeable, but "with clout." So, if you or someone you know is this person, could you contact us? His website , which usually shows his commercial work, has been refurbished with some of these portraits (even more impressive as large prints). There you will find contact info as well.

Back home

2008-05-31T20:26:00.000-07:00

Back home again, since about midnight last night. Totally jetlagged but pleased to be back. The flight was very long, especially since we spent an hour on the tarmac in NYC.

It was a beautiful, eventful, trip — but it was not relaxing. I must have been out of my mind to think that it would be relaxing. It's never relaxing when we're with John's family. We were all in Maine — from Texas, from NYC, from Boston, from SF (our contingent), from Ireland — and there was antiquing and pingpong and cards and art galleries and a boatride to Monhegan and lots of eating and a whole lot of drinking, but it was not relaxing. Although I did spend some time in the Adirondack chair pictured here reading John's Dublin cousin's novel manuscript.

And there was the wedding of course. "Your typical Maine Irish-Hindu wedding overlooking the ocean" as the minister said. Dramatic clouds and wind, but the rain held off. The bride and groom did a great Argentine tango!

Maine chance

2008-05-21T19:44:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I'm sure that's the first time that pun was used. Anyway, if all goes well, we'll shortly be off on the red-eye to Maine, for our lovely niece's wedding and a week in Port Clyde of Doing Nothing. Of course my version of doing nothing means: reading, writing, long walks. We're sharing a house with my brother-in-law and his wife and a cousin from Ireland.

I'm excited about the whole deal -- well, not the flight; that sucks. Tomorrow morning we'll have breakfast with my son on his 26th birthday -- in Boston. He and his wife are doing a baseball vacation Back East, and are all set to go to Fenway at noon. Then we drive up to Maine with her sister, our other niece.

The bride is marrying a Indian-Canadian and will be wearing a green sari. There is to be Indian food and music and events all weekend -- clambake on the beach on Memorial day.

I'm trying to deal with leaving my pooch. Someone is coming to look after her, but leaving her is so hard. Your should see her poor pathetic pooch face.

Islands Apart

2008-05-09T12:58:00.000-07:00

I’ve been terrible about blogging. Blame the fact that, as Eavan Boland puts it in an essay I loved in the current Poetry, “Whether we like it or not, the contemporary poet is increasingly skill-based. Or expected to be. He or she can — or should — lecture, lead a workshop, run an introductory class, teach composition, write a review, give a conference paper [and blog!]. But there is always a fraction — even if it’s just a small minority — of poets out in the world who don’t want to do any of these things. If there’s a conversation, they’re having it with themselves, with their own poems. They don’t want to extend it, share it, structure it. They are private, inward, and dissociated from the skills on offer or in demand. Once I thought there was a broad tolerance for this. Now I’m not so sure.”

Meanwhile, we’re finally moving next week to our “new” home across the Bay! “New” is in quotes because it’s the home where I grew up. You can see the booties we’ve been ordered to wear to protect the newly refinished floors. Just wait till our cats move in, though: you won’t catch them in no damn booties!

Sunset on daffodils = yellow

2008-04-11T23:15:00.000-07:00

Greta in the tall grass (Brooks Park)

2008-04-11T20:28:00.000-07:00

Squirrels and Turtles and Ducks ...

2008-04-11T14:00:00.000-07:00

Oh my! Well, sorry bout that. Not much profundity lurking in this noggin of late. Yeah, I'm depressed, and yeah, what else is new. Didn't sleep very well last night, but this morning, as it's Friday and my day to work at home (instead of commuting an hour+ to Mountain View), I didn't get up in the dark to walk pooch, but took her by car to Stern Grove-Pine Lake.

Spring has sprung. Small birds zipped around. (For all I know, it was the same bird!) You could hear, though not see, an industrious woodpecker. The ducks were paired up, the turtles, a whole bunch of 'em, stretched their necks all the way out as they sunned on a log. Greta, whose squirrel-hunting days are over -- was very excited by their scent nevertheless.

It was really very lovely. Fluffy stuff, like snow, blew on the breeze.

Slut for Sound

2008-03-27T19:50:00.000-07:00

Haven't had anything terribly profound to post -- but really, why should that stop me? Life has been, well, not very stressful for me (way less stressful than last year at this time), but somewhat difficult -- physical things, irksome things that are not worth talking about, but take up a great deal of time and brain space all the same.

But I want to talk about poetry. C. Dale asks "What makes us choose what we choose when we write?" My answer is definitely music. I don't think that's such a great answer, but it's my answer nonetheless. I play by ear, that's all. More than images, more than ideas, I'm a slut for sound -- and often the beat and vowel sounds will fill my ear even before the words are shaped. Strangely, this is not only what gets me writing poetry -- although it's a heightened experience for poetry. As I'm typing now, I hear the shape of the words before I know precisely what it is that I want to write.

Which is to say that it isn't necessarily gorgeous sounds that I seek -- no, that seek me. Rather, they are like chords that needs one note behind them that insists on being played. I think I may be a victim, more than most, of sound worms. A theme song I hear on the radio on the way to work will be in my mind for a week or more. More than that, in a compulsion almost like Tourette's, words take shape in my mouth and need to be uttered. These words are often names I hear: Moktada al-Sadr, Sylvia Poggioli, Lourdes Garcia-Navarro, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad -- all, regardless of who they are, that are like candy in my mouth.

There's an answer.

Wild! Check This Out!

2008-02-27T19:38:00.000-08:00

This is so wild! Take a look:

http://www.maniacworld.com/frozen-in-grand-central-station.html

There used to be a group in SF (called the Cacophony Society) that would do off-the-wall things. Don't know what happened to them. Maybe (sigh) they grew up. So half of what intrigues me here is that the people who did this did it in Grand Central Station in NYC. Very cool. And interesting how unnerved people got. This could almost be considered subversive, dangerous.

In other news: In a Salon article this evening, I came across the headline:

Headless Body in Topless Bar

It cracks me up. Okay, life hasn't been much fun lately. But Spring is coming, and I'm jazzed. Hehe. I want to write a poem with this title!

Vanishing Point

2008-02-14T14:59:00.000-08:00

Hey, I've got a poem in Blackbird.

Weasels

2008-02-14T09:29:00.000-08:00

And a happy Valentine's Day to you. This quote, by Matt Groening, was in this morning's Chronicle. "Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come."

I have the Fever -- Post-AWP Sick As Dog Post

2008-02-06T19:01:00.000-08:00

Don't know where that expression came from, but my dog is in much better shape than I am right now -- except that loud coughs and sneezes spook her and she's keeping herself out back. I have the fever, sore throat, the works, and by now, even with the honey tea, my chest feels like it was scrubbed with a copper scrubbee. I've been like this since I woke up at home on Sunday.

Still, I'm hesitant to stay out of work another day. (I dragged myself in on Monday and Tuesday, but today I just couldn't.) John brought me home some Japanese vegetable udon (noodles) from the corner before he went to his Advanced Photoshop class.

Since it's been this long, don't know if it's worth posting my AWP impressions, but here goes: It was interesting to be in New York, and even though I've lived away from it longer than I lived there, I had all these atavistic memories, like the dried brown leaves along the roadway and the water seepage in the subways. Then there was the each-person-for-himself drivers, the body slam I got when I hesitated on a corner trying to decide which way was east -- apparently I was in her way -- the person declaiming to himself/the entire baggage carousel that if he heated his house that hot, his wife would beat him with a baseball bat. Ah, New York!

The conference itself was fun but might have been more fun if I had a home base, an organization where I belonged. Oh there were a few people/organizations who said come and see me, and there were the celebs whom it was fun to see -- Bly, CK Williams, Billy Collins, others. And hanging with Robert, as I said, I was made to feel at home where he was welcome. I saw Greg Rappleye, as he mentioned, and C. Dale, who I don't have to go that far to see. I saw Paul Guest from afar, but he was always surrounded by admirers, and I doubt he knows me. I wish I saw Eduardo. We could have talked about Upstate NY -- I went to school in Rochester. Snow anyone?

I'm happy I stayed in the Hilton. When it just got too much, I could always go up to my room and take a break. I think the rate I got was half price -- and anyway, I just stayed for two nights. That was okay -- I'm not much of a party girl, and the music was loud!

Aside from Robert and Greg's panel, I went to and enjoyed the Graywolf one and the one on UltraTalk Poetry. David Kirby is a blast, and he looks like Steve Martin. If his poetry were ultra-serious, that might be a problem, but as it was ...

On My Way Home

2008-02-02T14:51:00.000-08:00

Will be boarding in five minutes. But it's going to take a long time to process everything that happened here in NYC at AWP. No big news, but a lot of encouragement. Mostly it was fun -- including, maybe especially, seeing my buddies Dennis and Billy from high school days and eating at an amazing Korean restaurant in the East Village. Robert and I hung out a lot, and that was great. I met a great many people. Oh, boarding.

Off to AWP

2008-01-29T22:24:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm going. I'm working all day tomorrow and not leaving until 11:00 -- on the redeye, but I'm going. I figure I will be in the air 10 hours and in New York, from touchdown to takeoff, a total of 37 hours. (I could only take so much time from work, and even at reduced conference rates, could only afford two nights at the Hilton.) I am looking forward to my Hilton stay. I mean I can't remember the last time I had a bathroom all to myself.

Well, other than a spiffy bathroom and a room of my own for two nights, why am I going? Hell if I know. It's just I figured if I were ever to go to this thing, I might as well go to it the year it's in NYC. I'm from the New York area, though after 31 years in SF, the Big Apple (do they still call it that?) is only a dim memory. I mean, the twin towers were only there a few years before I left. I guess I'm hoping to make the acquaintance, if only in passing, of people I know in print or on blogs. I'll go to Robert and Greg's panel. I'll sneak out for drinks with a couple old friends. And then it will be time to return. Maybe I'll meet someone who will ask me to send my manuscript. Maybe not.

Kitsch: Thought for the Day

2008-01-16T08:48:00.000-08:00

I’ve been reading The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century by Alex Ross and was struck by this in a chapter on the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius:

“Mainstream audiences may lag behind the intellectual classes in appreciating the more adventurous composers, but sometimes they are quicker to perceive the value of music that the politicians of style fail to comprehend. Nicolas Slonimsky once put together a delightful book titled Lexicon of Music Invective, anthologizing wrongheaded music criticism in which now canonical masterpieces were compared to feline caterwauling, barnyard noises, and so on. Slonimsky should also have written a Lexicon of Musical Condescension, gathering high-minded essays in which now canonical masterpieces were dismissed as kitsch, with a long section reserved for Sibelius.”

Pink Ocean

2008-01-04T09:52:00.000-08:00

I really should fire up my work computer and see if there's any work for me. I am glad to be home! I did take Greta out in this storm this morning. My jacket kept me dry down to my thighs. The rest of me looked and felt like I'd slipped into the Bay. So I'm not any too anxious to shower and get all wet again. I'm sitting here at the table, dawdling over a second cup of coffee.

I just read the Stuart Dybek piece in the new Poetry. They call it "fiction," because it isn't really comment, though it's in their Comment section, and it's not shaped like a poem. But it is the most incredible piece of writing I've read in, what, years? Ages? I can't think of an appropriate hyperbole. It is absolutely wonderful. It has so many levels -- the aural and oral and tactile and visual and psychological and critical (as in literary) -- and narrative as well.

I don't know if it's on their website. Wait, I just checked. It is called: Pink Ocean. Read it now!