my friend Michael wants us to meet up at this reading. we have friends coming over saturday, however, so it is no go. I remain interested.

but.

that picture.

of the dead elk.

bugs me.

is the guy with knife and gun Buck Downs? I realize, writing this, that I assume a lot as I wriggle with the inferences of the picture. no, I do not like the idea of hunting but, yes, I eat meat. file my judgments, which I shan't even enumerate here, under whatever. it is the poetry not the poet that is of interest, as is proven by all our faded heroes. still, killing an elk seems wasteful. I mean, the rare opportunity to see a elk, and then to plug it. I could be sadly unprepared to face the irony of this picture. it seems creepy as a promo picture, tho, doesn't it? I would still want to hear Downs read, and of course Eileen Myles, but a part of me would think of the elk.