When the Invitation Arrives

the poets in the minefields of Pennsylvania labour day and night to produce the fairest examples of their craft. in California the entire population is in love, dreamy love, love without bounds or off track betting. in the wee country of Liechtenstein comrades walk straight to the shoe factory every morning to receive their free sneakers. in Rwanda the lions share their bread with the dead. and while this joy more than subsists, the moon looks down. the moon has pretensions to understanding, just like us, for the moon rolls thru the heavens tied to earth’s mesmerizing gaze. most people don’t care about that. in every inch of the land once known as Russia people open boxes with hope in their hearts. in Japan, the brilliant bullet trains add zest to understanding, such suddenness, such noise. and on it goes. a puddle called Walden Pond extrudes facts daily, and when people drown there, they drown deeply. no mention yet has been made of the delightful fund of lyres that the Grecian model government stockpiles for times of need, an agreeable figurative uncommon hug for one and all. France has learned to emulate the finest mountains of Peru, and even Parisians (formerly, a pox on them) are newly cheerful and inclined to greet Incas without ponderous escapade. Honduras cannot hide its cheeky aurora, Canada has half a mind to shout with glee, Tonga and Madagascar have learned frantic hand-holding tricks, Poland grips the ball with new surety, everything Chinese adds the lift of oneness, trees sprout in the rocks of Thailand, chirping Floridians remove their masks, and everyone, everywhere, dances this glow. all this, friends, can be shipped right to your doormat.

Jean Vengua muses on Paul Metcalf, the reminder of whom (and his writing) is lovely to this child. I don't remember how I came upon Metcalf's work, probably via those Olsonian journals that were a-plenty in the 70s and 80s. he drew particularly from Melville's practical side (as Olson drew from Melville's impractical). the harvested facts and opinions that formed the basis of much of his work developed a lyrical content as he chockablocked them. in some ways, he was like a sensible Pound. and there was a novelist aspect to his work, indeed. this sense of viewpoint and aspect conditioned what he wrote, tho in form he tore from the novel pattern (his early work, the largely standard novel Will West, is awkward in the way it holds itself back). I shall have to dig out my Metcalf trove. thinking on Metcalf distills thoughts about reputations. it seems, tho I'm not the best judge, that he has faded already. death don't have no mercy, as I hear. th flush of newness seems commanding nowadays. I think much can be learned from Metcalf. if nothing else, he always excites me to read, to look for the poetic in other venues than poetry books.

More on FISHER Cats

fisher cats, or more properly, fishers, belong to the marten family. they have pointy teeth and sharp claws. fishers generally weigh about 25 pounds, on earth. one fisher can tear down a house in 15 minutes. they have a rapacious appetite and a roisterous sense of humour. they just love to eat Republicans and frolic in diatomaceous earth. when domesticated, they prove to be able accountants because they are very good with figures and they don't care who they hurt. if you run over a fisher, its pack will find you and tear you to shreds. they will then drag your remains to their secret hideout and poop on them. they have infiltrated New England and their armies are spreading across the country.

listening to Olson at Goddard College (from Penn Sound, dummy pants), heck why do people read poems, just? promise: next reading I give, and I will read again (exclaim Days Poem publicly, why don't I?), I shall moremore than poetry. that process, as it occurs, is important. the made thing already happened, so the moment of the reading had ought to include the moment of the reading. which could, indeed, include a poem that I might have forethoughtedly brought. think of that Vancouver reading, thronged with excitement. and one infers that the entertainment of poetry wasn't the only thrill, but the educating force of thinking minds also riled the audience. are readings like that nowadays? I don't mean to imply that my jibber jab would be such, I mean only it would be a shift of emphasis from a showoffy push of the poem here that visited me. if I wrapped myself around the moment, where the audience and the poems I thought to bring and whatever leaves of grass in my grey matter all could gather a momentum of expression, wouldn't that hold a candle? do you see what I am painting, and where? unguard yourself, that's the message, me and you alike.

nice succinctitude from Rodney Koeneke. and it is not a matter of originality, a bogus concept really, but the poet's connection to the active making of the work. drive your own bus, that is, because it is the process not the production that means anything.

in lieu of reading hip dreadnaught BAP bashing again, you tickle the eyeball and the brain behind it with the further poetic ruminations of Jeff Harrison and Yours Truly at Antic View, the full service poetry blog.

saw Wild Hogs, an uneven comedy that should have starred Steve Nothing and Shirley Null but instead boasted a million dollar cast. it had its moments but I am astonished by how bad Travolta was. and that's coming from someone who sees no reason why he's employed in showbiz. considered yourself warned.