Pats won, Sox still are champs, and a nifty reading at Demolicious today, featuring Charley Shively and Tom Beckett. nice weather too. I'll speak of the reading. Beth in NYC with her mother so I trained in. killing time I walked from Porter Square to Central, then rambled some more. finally, in front of the gallery, I saw a familiar, from photos, figure, and the clincher that he's tall: Tom Beckett. I introduced myself. I've 'known' Tom for more than 20 years, I imagine. his journal, The Difficulties, however I came to it, was integral to my development as a poem making type writer. I think Tom's contribution to poetry as an editor is worthy of whatever Hall of Fame that exists for poetry (none, I realize, but pretend one does), just as Babe Ruth's pitching stats could put him in Cooperstown, forget about the 714. Tom's poetry, as I discovered in the spare publications of his own works that I got, is a strong, definite statement. we have the further category of blogger, tho he's seen fit to shutter his latest blog. Tom was accompanied by his daughter and son in law, who live in Brookline, home town of Theo Epstein. as he and I were conversing, I'm an awesome converser, he told me that a friend of his was behind me. this friend, I heard his name as Jeff Booth. from NY, near Albany, I think. it wasn't till Tom read a poem dedicated to this Jeff Booth that I gleaned that Jeff Booth was in fact Geof Huth. Geof Huth is a wonderful, I'll even say cruciual, poet and, dare I say, scholar. his work is really avant in the visual context. I hope he can be persuaded to read locally. the reading, as usual, began with the local poet, Charley Shively. I only knew him by name. he was a friend of Wieners. he was also, and I'm sure still is, a legendary gay rights activist. he's a retired history professor. none of which did I know before he read. his reading was quirky and charming. think absentminded, if not dazed, professor. by dazed I am trying to describe an ephemeral quality. a very present and unencumbered attention. I mean, he wore unmatched shoes, and he said whatever sluiced into the main channel first. I can imagine he was a popular professor but drove a cetrtain few students crazy. such students would not just wonder what his last remark had to do with the Peloponnesian War but what the Peloponnisian War had to do with anything today. his observations and tangents were integral to his reading. given his general driftiness, which I do not present as a negative quality, his muscular sense of syllable was maybe a surprise. his poems appeareed to be short-lined affairs, and he read them with a careful syllable by syllablpe rhythm. he didn't exert much vocal dynamics, but the words came thru with a strong metric. he read for quite a while, timelessly, you might say. no way that I can replicate his performance. his 1st poem, which was to Wieners, and in fact was edited by him, included an aside about a dream he had in which Wieners was blowing Bob Dylan. I don't know what I can add to that. happily Jack Kimball attended and his reportage will no doubt supply a richer impression of the event than I can supply. from the small sampling I am willing to suggest that Shively is a great poet. Wieners class, that is. that was a hard act to follow but Tom gave a terrific reading too. he read entirely from Unprotecxted texts. which is a wonderful book, highly recommended. he read the entire Zombies series, which is funny, quirky and inviting. the lengthy, self-revelatory piece that followed, argh what's the title, was a tour de force, and solicited deserved applause even as he was starting his next set of poems. Tom read in a dry but involved way. his last reading was 7 years ago. you'd think the powers of NYC would be enlightened enough to invite someone of Tom's credentials to read. special thanks to John and Andrew for bringing Tom to town. let's get it straight: Tom isn't just sputum from an mfa program, he isn't just the newest vanilla to write a poem, he isn't just that friend of the friend of the friend, he isn't the latest advertising approach, he isn't the glory of sneer factor. no, Tom Beckett is a writer and editor of poetry, a poet living not on the cushy pulse but in the rugged definitions of the hinterland. do you see that the colostomy of networking is a failed sizzle, New York New York? the heroes aren't the ones who tell you they are heroes, okay? Beckett and Shively are clearly under-regarded. and Geof Huth, unexpected guest, should be given David Ortiz level praise as an innovator. as per, extra innings occurred at a pleasant Irish bar down the block (food's pretty good, tho I didn't partake today). where I sat didn't allow me to enter the conversation of Tom, Geof, Charley and Jack, but I had a good conversation with John Mercuri Dooley, who helped bring the event to fruition. I didn't start writing till I was 16, which is later than a number of writers I know. John didn't start till he was in his 40s. it is curious how we come to our expressions, how the necessities declare themselves. John and Andrew deserve commendation for the variety of readers that they've chosen for their series. that inclusion extends to the friendly nature of their events. the gatherings after the readings are as important as the readings themselves. alas that I had a train to catch. I scooted while things were still bubbling. great event, even so.

watched Blades of Glory yestreen. Will Farrell now identified as a go to guy. neither of the WF star vehicles that I've seen are perfect but they have a consistent artistic demeanour, let us say. I don't think that Farrell is a one trick pony. it seems like he has a vision of his work. but my experience of his work is slight so I wouldn't want to press this opinion too far. this one is about competitive skating, which is as likely as a subject, because of its local weirdness, as NASCAR. Farrell is paired with ugh I can't recall the actor's name, as rival skaters. the other skater, Jimmy, is fey (1st time I ever used that word) and sensitive, stereotypical skater type. Farrell's Chazz is bumptiously macho, rowdy rock star. our 1st encounter with the adult Jimmy, he wears peacock feathers on his rump and is a study of ridiculous skaterly grace. the movie captures the obsequious patter of skating announcers, and the crowd as suckers for the show. near the end, famous Jim Lampley gets to tell his announcing partner (Scott Hamilton, in fact) that he just wet his pants. Chazz comes on like a pro wrestler, strutting and emblazoned sex. it's such a toot to see. naturally the 2 get into a fight during the awards ceremony, naturally they are banned for life from competition. after a quick 3 years of dark night of the soul for them, they are brought together as a pair, since it isn't specified in the rules that they can't. that's all de rigueur stuff. fire and ice. I'm not capturing the good parts of the movie with this recount. the two actors work well together. Farrell, the star, looks comfortable sharing the screen. his characters need something to bounce against, anyway. his swagger arrives from the moon or somewhere, just as in Talledega Nights. Jon Heder, who must be someone but he's new to me, looks properly whippet-like to suggest a skater but Farrell looks like sitting on the front porch with a beer. the movie sneaks past campiness, just barely I think. for all the grace and athleticism of the sport, it has a high density of schlockiness. the whole play to the crowd aspect is what undermines it as a sport. so the target is rich. the skating routines are great, combining piss ant drama and physical impossibility. the movie tails off when the plot becomes needy. I know plot and denouement are integral to such a spoofy approach but plot really becomes dead air so often, a linear express to the next set piece. it's time, friends, that we review our need for plot. the resolutions seem mostly sham or incomplete. the Pirates of the Caribbean movies have been criticized for their confusing plot. I think the confusion comes from a need to make plot sense. if Johnny Depp et al weren't bound by that necessity, the play could be more adventurous. poetry is far from cured of that narrative need, that sort of storytelling completion, but at least the issue is on the table. we're totally inured to the auto pilot in artworks, it's hard to break thru to the mechanics. in the finale of Lord of the Rings, movie version, there's a smirky grand depletion of plot points amongst the survivours. Tolkien did the work at a respectful pace. in the movie, clock running, it's a nod to all. which particularly gives the scene with Viggo at marrying point with Liv an odd scantness. the movie's so homoerotic, another word I've never used before, that this ceremonious inclusion of a female jostles the mind. where'd she come from, basically. from a need to tie loose ends. a satisfaction exists in that, but girls are so rare in the movie that we really aren't prepared for this normative streak. it almost happens in Blades. you can see the bond between the guys, similar drives and interests. when the girl comes along, the attraction is mostly that she's kinda pretty. well gee whiz, if you want to make plots work, you have to cut out a lot of interesting stuff. if you want Viggo and Liv to look right together, you'll have to cut out monsters and sword play. in Blades, if you really need to tie Jimmy to the sweetheart, you'd have to sacrifice the good stuff on the ice. ah well. it was a fun movie, anyway. I'll take Farrell over Jack Black, who seems like a 2nd rate Lou Costello or even Curly Howard.

U Cal Press sent this link: Mark Twain. I like Twain, judiciously (H Finn). more wowzer is just the idea of a chugging press offering what do they call it content fer free. I haven't run the metrics to say that the thing works (sells hard copy books) but I'm thinking as how it does. anyway, when he aint all a-gloom, morbid, self-pitying, and that, Mark Twain is the berries.

poetry, haw! I don't write it. I write sentences, and I sometimes jiggle them. and that satisfies my writin' urge. I've done my study of poetry, learned to like some of it. for the 1st time in my life, I'm writing rarely. this isn't a bad thing, just different. my writing rhythm has been jostled, no biggie. and the dog that is not here describes a space that I haven't figured how to fill. ANYWAY, I'll be tuning in Tom Beckett and Charley Shively at Demolicious on sunday. I only know of Shively, local writer, so this will swell my local awareness (a likable tactic for the series: one local, one foreigner in each reading). Tom Beckett is one of the undersung heroes of the poetry landscape. most definitely wrangling with his journal The Difficulties greatly changed my writing arc, as did having Grenier as a teacher for a year. elsewise I'd be lyricking some false motive or another, romantic view of the poet as confessional claptrap and heroic bum out. I like Tom's spareness, antipodal to my wordy way. and just to finish this ramble, a house didst I see hereabouts, decorated for Halloween, with ghosts and Jack o' lanterns all a-glow. plus a sign: We Support Our Troops. so the ectoplasmic crowd support the reaper man, quel surprise!!!

not sure why but Erin brought home a tape of Phantom of the Opera, and he watched it last night. I didn't intend to watch but got sucked in. I think Erin wanted the musical, at any rate, he didn't mean to watch the silent version. which, in a better world, would be b&w, not colourized. yet it was intriguing, me talking. it starred Lon Chaney, pere. I have a feeling that Lon Chaney jr was only a junior in the sense of playing on name rep, that his 1st name was probably Carlton or Clell or whatever. I also get the feeling that Jr wasn't a fully willing Hollywood entity, that dad's occupation kinda became his in that relentless family business way. thus Junior as Larry Talbot/Wolfman, tragic. anyhoo, I'd seen the Herbert Lom version of P of the O years ago (Lon, Lom, hmmm...), which was pretty good in a crisp 60s way. I heard somewhere, can't give reference, that Lon Chaney was pretty intense about his makeup, that he, for intense, used fish hooks to make his face look as it did in Phantom. owie! I believe, as well, that he did something drastic to twist his body for Quasimodo. I do not know why I retain such info (if it is info): I'm not that cinematically tuned. the Phantom is downright crazy in this film, rather than a bit toasted as he seems in the Lom vehicle. the movie was not all that cinematic, yet this staginess gave an otherworldliness to the proceedings. and there were some lovely, theatrical tableaux involved. the acting was of a grand dimension, full of extended gestures and statuary poses, you know, back of the hand to the forehead while the other arm extends in fainting weakness. both Christine and her noble salty dog managed that one several times each. Phantom was more like a mage or televangelist in his sweeping gestures. I wasn't paying full attention when the Phantom swam in the sewer, sneaking into the opera house, I think. steps out of the water wearing his cape, puts his hat on. kinda weird. you see the actors as loci for strange forces. they hadn't gotten the intimacy possible with movie cameras back then. I'm not saying that's a bad thing. I wasn't following the plot at all, just looking up now and then to witness some inscrutable strangeness. at one point Christine's lover and a friend tried to raid the Phantom's lair. he catches on to their sneak attack and implements a sudden heating of the chamber where they are. no explanation how this heating works, or why he'd be so prepared. suddenly the room is deathly hot and our hopeful heroes are in extremis. they get the idea eventually to remove their waistcoats and ties--mon dieu!!!-- but even that wouldn't save them. suddenly, tho, they discover a trap door, and they escape into a tunnel or sewer. but further suddenly, the Phantom unleashes a flood and it looks like they're a goner. luckily, or tragically, Christine agrees to do whatever the Phantom says if he will save they. he proceeds to throw the carpet aside and open the trapdoor in that room, and there the sad victims are, this close to death's grim maw. well okay, that's about all I saw. I reiterate that the Phantom was quite the loony. to the degree, I mean, that he proves unsettling. I don't know what any of this has to do with Martin Heidegger. er, I really am reading Heidegger, on poetry. I am certain that the thingliness of Chaney somehow...er...

we might've headed east this evening, to Somerville, where the book party for the Wieners book Prophecies was held. I like the excitement of this, and Wieners being honoured. there's a part of me, however, that hesitates at the Wieners adulation. only in the sense that he is not 'our' only poet. the identification here with Wieners seems a little desperate, I sometimes think. I mean the need to have a Wieners as a Boston poet. it's part of what makes Boston so small. but I digress. we went west instead, to a party that would likely be Erin's and our last among the homeschool/Shakespeare crowd. it was rainy today, grey, but as we headed to the party, the sun started to find a way thru the clouds. this gave a captivating golden tinge to the sky, and electrified the autumnal colour of the trees. the wind was swift, driving clouds east. then we saw a rainbow. a very strongly coloured one, the spectral segments were clearly defined. and the arc was a full 180 degrees. on top of that, there was a 2nd one, paler but still vibrant. this was enough to get us to pull over. Erin, luckily, had his phone i. e. camera, and I hope the pictures he took come out okay. a compelling necessity exists in writers to describe. this can manifest as the crummy novelistic descriptions that occur in stories and poems, where adjectives are plastered on the thing in vividly pointless excess. I aint talking that kind of description. I mean the internal interplay of feeling and thing. a nod, serious nod to the thingness of the thing, if I may gingerly bring Heidegger to the fire [I meant to type to the fore but I like my accidental image]. description in an active and processual sense. be not afraid to picture the thing and bring it to mind with a colloquy of wondering words. the excitement of any poetry is the excitement of thingness. the dynamic visual experience and excitement of the rainbow is not fulfilled in the adjectival delineation that I wrote above. I hint at the experience. a poem is the experience. not of the rainbow or whatever thing, but of the language of thingness, or the thingness of language. today's rainbows would make a lot of people look, remark. they are a stirring phenomenon, hard to believe. any phenomenon is thus, but our blighted eyes refuse to stir, most times. this fabulous sight awakens a primordial need to wonder, feel awe. and there is a language that wants to accommodate that wonder...

Richard Lopez comments below on Signs. he's more knowledgeable about movies, more thougtfully prepared to discuss them. still, I have a keyboard and fingers, and an urge to process publicly. I don't really disagree with his view of the movie, except that I liked the thing a lot. saying that uncovers the limitations of my movie aesthetic. I almost never accept a movie's serious face value. I dislike the practiced resolutions of fiction in general and specific. I'm really taken by the interplay of the 4 main characters in Signs. the boy is mopey, the girl eccentric, the brother goofy, and all 3 are charming. the father, the minister who has lost his faith--Mel Gibson, that is (and it won't be easy to ignore Mel the anti-semitic drunk, just as I'll never watch Seinfeld again without thinking of Kramer drowning in flop sweat)--maintains a dry humour, especially with his kids. Shyamalian plays them together superbly. I'll go to the mat on that point. at several places the plot seems rushed, which it probably is. Shyamalian spent quite a bit of time letting the family develope before our eyes, thus he had to shorthand the story. I'll accept that. I find the implicative rush of plot the downfall of movies and novels. the pale, frail imitation of life that plot entails so often distracts from the characters and the words they speak. and the gravy train lessons that one must take from the plot's purposeful striding is often malarkey. when you watch a movie again, or reread a novel, you no longer have the surprise of plot to pull you. the way the characters present themselves, and how the narration stands on the structure: these are what attracts the imagination. so I'm fine with the holes in plot and the nervy necessity of a fine resolution in Signs. my interest is elsewhere.

mosaic

mosaic, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

sidewalk

sidewalk, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

poet in mud

poet in mud, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

saw the movie Signs last night. saw it before but I think on commercial tv, not that much if anything would have been cut. we bought the thing because we knew we liked it. the store offered Saw II for 5 bucks with a regular-priced purchase but I politely said no thanks. the movie begins with plenty of tension, tho it isn't readily explicable. 1st, there's something slightly exalted about the colour of the movie, a trifle surreal. 2nd, a note of desperation rings out without clear explanation. Mel Gibson wakes suddenly and rushes from bed. Joachim Phoenix does likewise and they rush out to find the children, who are yelling, and the dogs are barking. they find Gibson's children in the cornfield and the reason for the ruckus: a crop circle. okay, so it's about an alien invasion, part Independence Day, part War of the Worlds and part Childhood's End. M Night Shyamalian wrote and directed. there's a terrific rapport amongst the 4 leads. the children (one's a Culkin, the other was in Little Miss Sunshine) were sparkling, the boy glum and dour, the girl cutely eccentric. Gibson bears the dramatic weight. he plays a former minister who gave up the cloth when his wife was killed in a car accident. that's a bit heavy-handed but it works in context. and tho Gibson has to pull out the stops at times, the role is still played with lightness. Phoenix is hilarious as the supportive, slightly goofy younger brother. in real life he must be more than 20 years younger than Gibson. ominous signs become a real invasion, which we hear about only thru news reports that the family hears. at one point, the man who hit Gibson's wife (fell asleep at the wheel) meets with Gibson to apologize. Shaymalian himself plays the role. Gibson gets to emote big time and Shyamalian rather clumsily slips a key plot point in. his character says that he's going to the lake because it appears the aliens don't like water. he took this assumption from the fact that the crop circles weren't near water. a leap. his last line to Gibson is, don't open the door to my cupboard, I caught one of the aliens and put it in there. then he drove off. nice surprise line. Gibson tries to get a peek at the creature by using a large knife to reflect under the door. the alien grabs at him so Gibson wields the knife and slices off fingers. then the big scene in which the 4 hole up in the farmhouse, windows boarded, and await the aliens. so there's a nod to of the Living Dead. the aliens don't quite get into the basement where the family made their final stand. the boy, however, has an asthmatic attack, and his meds are upstairs. in the morning the news, rather too precipitously for my taste, reveals that the aliens left because water was found to be anathema to them. that's a little like War of the Worlds, but it also smacked of a director who looked at his watch. anyway, they go upstairs looking for the meds and, yow, an alien gets hold of the boy. we've already learned that they have poisonous breath. and we see that the alien is missing some digits: a vindictive alien!!! the boy gets a whiff of the poison, the alien drops him when the girl screams. Phoenix wields the baseball bat that he used to hit a ball 507' in the minors to battle the alien while Gibson tries to resuscitate his son. water gets on the alien and we can think of the wicked witch of the west. and guess what, asthma closed the boy's lungs to the poison. and Gibson returns to the cloth. the humour and the tension of the movie pair nicely. I think it is the onloy Shyamalian movie that I've seen but I'd watch more willingly.

below are a couple of shots I took at Fairyland Pond in Concord. it's a short distance from Walden, on the other side of rt 2. autumn is right about at its acme of colour and thrill. yestreen was possibly frosty and we'll be rolling now to the spareness of late fall here.

, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

noticed haply and happily that Alli Warren has a new e-chapbook from Duration Press called No Can Do. tho she certainly can, and does. I notice that she eschews punctuation somewhat, which gives a fluid reading, or maybe I mean a more wobbly, less entrenched, sense of syntax. her poetry asserts positions then undermines these positions with a booming albeit underlying political impression. doing so illustrates an essential quality of poetry, of the political impact of our language. this is superficially belied by her playfulness, which allows her work to dance in corners. I should shut up and just leave this post as a recommendation for you to download the pdf. find out for yourself, that is.

I've been pokily reading the wild piece by Ted Berrigan and Harris Schiff, a transcription of the 2 of them at a Yankees/Red Sox game, 1977. it's a hilarious performance, tho gruesome to think of these guys hyped on pills, which they pop thru out the game. I like it as a historical document, with names like Reggie Jackson, Yaz, Bernie Carbo, Billy Martin. I also have a similar piece done by Bernadette Mayer and Anne Waldman, a basketball game. in each, that New Yorkish sense of now, that must be transcribed. of course there is nothing more self-conscious than such performances, just like reality tv, so they must be read in that light. the drug use brings to mind some issues. we know the physical harm of that, but that's outside my concern. disordering the senses: there is a truth to that, I mean a functional one. one may discover, however, that that disordering becomes an attempt to repeat earlier experiences. that is, I think the trick works only for a while. at least, I think one should be wary of a mechanical method, in any sense, in the creation of work. there have been several times in my life when the very last thing I would do before sleep was to write. the idea being that my defenses might be down. one can seek out distractions, whether it be drugs or alcohol, or writing in busy circs, like on a bus. et cetera. whatever one does, one needs enough self-awareness to acknowledge the workings of the methodology. if you use writing procedures, you have to observe if they become rote. Whitman so often pronounced grandly, but sometimes it was just imitation of earlier work. when people rail against NY poetry or LANGUAGE, they probably (when the critic is being fair) detect a rote quality, that the writer isn't being surprised by the work. the Berrigan/Schiff thing consists of them in babbling improv, boozy shenanigans. The Sonnets sticks out in Berrigan's work, his only extended use of cut ups (so far as I know). I know he lifts from here and transposes there elsewhere, but only in The Sonnets did he take that as the route itself. which is a wisdom. the life and liveliness of his work depends, I think, on his own sense of surprise. Jonathan Mayhew speaks of "O'Hara's negotations [sic] between gregariousness and introspection", a nifty encapsulation. it's that negotiation (sic does not mean 'wake up, stupid', no matter how full of oneself the user of the term may feel) that keeps the poetry (and the poet) interested. O'Hara caught between sharing and self-revelation. which is where the low wattage NY stuff trails off, where the imbalance between gregariousness and introspection produces a stiff, self-conscious construct of 'ideas'. so, in sum, let's get rid of crappy NY School poetry, tip our hats to those who lift the surprise, and let's move on.

lazily, I point you to the bio notes for Daniel Bouchard and Cathy Hong Park, which informatively lists their publications. it's okay to buy poetry books, even mine.

Demolicious reading yesterday, featuring Daniel Bouchard as the local poet and Cathy Hong Park from Brooklyn. DB read 1st, thanking those who chose poetry over Red Sox playoff (and Patriots juggernaut). as he typically does, he read someone else's work 1st: After Apple Picking by Frost. I saw him read WCW once and it was terrifically powerful; he clearly connected with the work. seemed less so with Frost. the highlight was perhaps the 2nd poem he read, "Rackline" from his 1st book. which is (still) in a box around here somewhere. the poem twines memories of a friend's funeral, depiction of his job collecting trash on Cape Cod, and observance of local birds. Silliman has claimed that he feels close to Bouchard's poetics, which I can only guess means the notation of dry, unembellished detail. dry is the word, as Bouchard read without much inflection or speaking to the audience. a more recent and more pointedly political poem also rang well. he read extensively. Cathy Hong Park read from a single book and... here I should mench the work that Jack Kimball does at readings. he takes notes, he asks for copies of poems read and otherwise performs a solid reportage effort. Jack being absent, I can only offer that which sticks in my brain 15 hours later. Hong said that in some mention of her, she was referred to as a South Korean dissident. I guess dissident just naturally attaches to South Korean. anyway, her book is a tour of an imaginary city. I just flashed on St John Perse and the kind of evocation he produced. Hong Park didn't use description so much as soliloquy to render this city, but still, there's a similar homage to the imagination. in style the work recalled Stacy Doris for me. a dashing, lively chatter of voices. her language, that of her characters, was a transformation of English, or pidgin, tho she never used that word. familiar phrases were shifted or punned upon, in a swelter of hilarity and speed. she read extremely well, channeling easily. it was a good reading, and the after-reading as always was fun. next month Tom Beckett and Chris Tonelli, to which I look forward.

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.

Jean Vengua recounts a mime attack--it can all be explained by the words, Berkeley, California--giving me the opportunity to speak of my Easter Bunny moment. to wit: running thru lovely Concord centre of an Easter morn I bespied The Easter Bunny. seeing me she, the voice was female, called out "Mike, get the runner". EB was across the street--okay, maybe it was someone in a costume--but this "Mike" was on my side of the street. Mike dutifully ran up alongside me and stuck out his hand. I understood the gesture and stuck out mine. Mike handed me jelly beans. I said thanks, running on, and Mike went back to receive more orders from The Easter BUNNY (sound dramatic music). it is a funny ole world.

Last Word

The green field
is a given
tho it takes away

light spills
across his path

he loves to
blink and stop
run and recede

the day darkens
in his exceptional run

we live in the names
and the positions of love

a heaven exists
of running on

we still hold something
in the fog
of our morning

2) Less the bolts of lightning
and less the fields
of lazy grass and
less the dog's
own mooring. Loss ejects the
pleasant sound of lost river,
tributary. Scour the landscape,
which the dog
now roams
full and light. Trees poke high
and dive deep. All union fixes
the sky. Our drama recedes
in the quickness of the dog's
run. Focus is our plan.

3) Only so much
room, only so much
love, the candidate
of love and moving on
comes to know
the green field
of perfect light feet.

The way is clear.

Love mentions us
in passing.

4) These days
are filled with night
and poems need
stars to bring
the words to
warm embrace.

The race is to
the end of this day
and the mortal start
of another.

Love connects the two.

5) It was a beautiful sunset.
The moment of touch
prosecuted an homage,
a peace, tender
information of
long green field.
Is it my job
to remember you? It is
my job to hold the space
we held together.
It remains your job
as well.

my dog passed away today... passed away, I eupheme, except a generous clarity enters the term. he slipped into death, sweetly, tho Beth and I cried. and I told him he'd be running, running ahead. he was part husky, part German shepherd, that sort of thing. I nicknamed him Next County Brownie because (typical of huskies, I am told (by Beth, who had purebreds)) given the opportunity to roam free, he'd take it. if he managed to get away, he was prepared to cover the map. it's the husky nature to find the way home, but that's after sufficient time to explore. under previous ownership he got away, and was found in a restaurant dumpster, living the good life. 4 days before 9/11, I trotted off to the nearby farmstand for dinner fixins. there by the side of the road was Brownie. I was surprised to see him there, 1st. 2nd, that he didn't trot gleefully away when I saw him said something bad. I went over to him and saw a gash in his shoulder. which looked like what another dog might've done (Brownie himself was anything but aggressive). and then I noticed that his foot, which he held off the ground, wobbled. I pieced together that he'd been hit by a car. so he had a broken leg, which was really traumatic for us, worry and expense. in fixing the break, the vets only worry about the main weight bearing bones, so tho he healed, his leg splayed and he wasn't quite as devastatingly fast as before. he wore a cast for a while. I'd be up early in the basement, writing and would hear the dog pace. thump thump thump, it sounded nothing but like Ahab on the deck. and the 1st chance that he saw an unattended open door, out he dashed, luckily Beth was in position to catch the boy. memories now attended as the life that was lived. our home now feels empty. the cat, a nervous fellow, is disturbed. he really, I mean truly, idolized Brownie. and Brownie, who was cool as a yankee, never really seemed to reciprocate. he bullied the cat tho it often seemed in a protective way. when people visited us, the dog would shove the cat, who did not readily cotton to visitors, away. all these specifics define nothing, of course. I so strongly see Brownie in the green light of some endless field, running without time as a burden. loss is a saturation. death demands that we look. tomorrow I will not walk the dog. it has been a retelling of my father's death.

snake

snake, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

perspective

perspective, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

web

web, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

chairs

chairs, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

1st of all, 3 demerits for not having charged spare camera batteries. we went apple picking, which on this perfected sunday afternoon is hard to argue with. for all its quaintness, as you might imagine. it isn't quaint, really. I mean, I used to think, pick 'em for me. but it is lovely among the trees, the sky so blue, air crisply clear tho warmish. the yellow delicious (called golden supreme) looked like fantastic flowers in the trees from a distance. I track particularly to empires and macouns. empires have a deep bluish red colour that is exquisite and tastewise are my favourite. bag of apple swag in one hand, camera in the other, until, alas, both batteries depleted. which was before we came upon some stones set as benches, on the edge of the forest. Stonehenge, where the dewdrops cry and the carts meow!!! then a tour of local new england nowhere, little towns on the NH border. anyway, pictures once I can retrieve them from a charged up camera.

Walden. last sunday Stephen Vincent and I met at the pond. he's on this coast for a number of functions, which he will likely recount on his blog. we met at the replica of Thoreau's hut, located in the parking lot across the street from the entrance to the pond. a crisp autumnal afternoon, postcard pretty. we circumambulated and talked. I like offering the local highlights to people, share my interest. Olson's sense, or sensation, of local very much excited me as I came to understand poetry, and the greater surge of writing. btw, Ron Silliman lists 25 recently received books. 24 are categorized as poetry. the 25th, The Light Sang as it Left Your Eyes by Eileen Tabios, was placed in the molten category of other. it is a fussy fustian that would make such a distinction. so Eileen's not a poet, eh, she's an otherist. which, frankly, I'd like to be, as well. but anyway. that tangent drew from my own, if not Mr Silliman's, fluid sense of poetry's boundaries. so anyway, we, this nuclear family, have taken Walden as a necessity. we've declared that sunlight on water, etc, is needed on the bows of our eyes. water is like that, certes. Beth was on the Jersey shore with a friend last weekend, feeling that resource. bodies of water bear primordial benefit, or something like. Walden is our local fare. today we brought picnic and settled near the shore. swimmers criss crossed the water. the sun glinted low with metallic harshness (last gasp). 3 pairs of mallards noisily preened and dabbled. Erin remained behind reading while Beth and I took a lap. autumn in th air and that rings an urge to read the English Romantics. always, this is true.

I saw a book today entitled Truth and Poetry Concerning Uric Acid. honestly, I did. sounds like a title I should use somewayhow but it's a 19th century medical book. Truth and Poetry placed in opposition. poetry as fabulous, unlikely and untruthful. it is fair to ask why such an interpretation could exist at all. poetry is a consternation of language. not a misuse, but an objective demand on language's boundaries. and, yes, there are effects in poetry that can make anyone wince, in every generation. the Byronic hero (which Byron himself could be pretty acerbic about) has yet to keel over, for instance, and of course, odes to dead animals. to say poetry is truth is to step onto a wobbly rock, but poetry possesses something that relates to others (readership) in a deep way. so that people who disparage or ignore poetry still accept an assertion pertaining to poetry, almost as a religious function. I cannot speak knowledgably of the truth of uric acid but I doubt not at all about the poetry of it. a language of uric acid, a communication of the processes and reactions involved with uric acid. think, in this world, of the details, each bit with a language. the novel JR by William Gass... [is that right???]... features a young boy as the title character. that boy makes the vivid point that everything you see, even toilets: someone has made a millions bucks on. every thing, too, has a word, every word possesses marks of poetry. I mean poetry as an aggressively expansive force in lives. I mean poetry as a conformation and challenge within the mighty relationship of out selves and the world. holy crap, this is a large involvement, people!!! so this medical book, from a bygone, but still: the poetry of uric acid: it exists!!!

this town here celebrated its 288th anniversary yesterday. it became a town when it got a church organized. the church, across the street, allowed 'us' to detach from neighbouring Billerica (3 syllable pronunciation, for those scoring at home). the celebration consisted of... lame maneuvers. noble canine and I scoped the territory out early, as things were setting up in the town hall parking lot. booths of veritable excitement. returning, I rousted Erin from bed (Beth is in NJ, by the seashore, with a friend). various town businesses and organizations showed their wares and/or wiles. I don't know the celebratory worth of hearing an insurance company's patter, frankly. Erin fell for the siren lure of fried dough, the presence of which was a concession to real town celebration. we went home, not far away, after that to change into dry clothes, for the windows of heaven were opened more than a crack. as we changed we could hear the town's fire engines and police cars, the beginning of the parade. we walked over to the green, across the street, to watch. Erin had his camera, Beth had mine. the town's DPW vehicles followed the emergency ones. someone in each vehicle tossed candy to the spectating forces along the street. this produced the effect of little children lunging avidly in front of dump trucks and such for the caramel bull's eye, Tootsie Roll or even Tootsie Pop that define their goal structure. rain became earnest at this time. apres such excitement was more organizations: scouts, athletics, bands etc. including the Mason's, who wore back suits, white gloves and what looked like a bib over their crotch (!!!). Erin;s karate school passed thru dramatically. Erin chose to pass on the parade this year. near the end of the parade the wind rose noticeably and the rain intensified, even like the tail end of a tropical storm. after noon the rain surprisingly cleared, so Erin and I went to the Native American Powwow just up the road at the VA Hospital grounds. pow wows are a yearly feature here but I've always missed them up till now. I didn't know what to expect. Erin said if it's a bunch of old men sweating then he's out. I can picture what he means but it wasn't so. the small open field held a ring of tented booths and in the centre a dance circle. the booths offered native American gimcrack, to put it crassly. jewelry and what not, much more interesting, tho, than what the insurance companies at the town celebration offered. the central feature was the 3 drum circle groups who supplied the music and impetus for the dancing in the circle. I know nothing from all this so excuse my ignorance. 6 or 7 males sat at a large tom tom. each beat on it and sang. drums incite me, no question. it is basic trance inducement. I love it. I felt like a clod watching the dancers but it is new to me. men, women and children would step into the circle in a gracious formal way and invest in the beat. I saw the steps taken, which I think is touch toe then touch full foot, then the same with the other foot. some waved fans. that's the measure, which is like a breath, which is a poetics in action. how this measure moves the individual is varied. some are very inward and meditative while others are outward and flash. children prancing, elders stately. the town celebration was so culturally inept, it wasn't there at all. Whereas I felt the cultural connection at the pow wow. there was a young fellow dressed up fine who sang with one of the drum groups. he wore a zowee 'native costume'. a red and black statement that is a translation of, say, John Travolta in Sat Nite Feev. he was a terrific dancer, a centripetal concentration. in the same group was one I suspected as his younger brother. he wore t-shirt and baseball cap. during one dance he came out and faced up his brother and they danced face to face, challenging yet lovely in the possibility of advance. They ended on the final beat with a synchronized pose, then hugged. my guess of their siblingship was confirmed by someone remarking on the brothers' performance. I saw an artistic energy of collaboration, which itself fits a challenge. one dance was for children, the candy dance. candy was scattered in the circle and the children danced until the singing stopped, at which point they could dive for the nearest candy. the song itself, the only English one that I heard, spoke of Tootsie Rolls and Charlston Chews. another dance was the jingle dance. this was for young women. several of whom wore costumes (I don't want to use that word) with jingly features. those features, it was explained, are generally made from the tops of snuff containers. a young dancer who was the female version of the guy in red, almost went en pointe in her dancing. she wore a brilliant yellow dress with myriad jangles. golly, it was all so lovely and direct. people certainly came from the further reaches of New England, if not further. some of the commercial offerings were telling, like hats stating Viet Nam Vet or Iraq Vet. I'd like to get that toe step down, tho I cannot feel common in the circle. I mean, I felt like white bread disease. my people celebrated their history by inviting insurance companies to show their wares.

still squeezing out some sultry days tho autumn clearly imminent. near 100 and humid yesterday. last week we cleaned windows and in doing so took the a/c out, for how hot will it get from now on? okay, so we misjudged that. late afternoon we headed north toward a seafood festival in Hampden Beach that we heard about. an all weekend affair. during the ride up we saw towering clouds and weird light, and some rain. New Hampshire's seashore is just a little more extensive than that of Kansas, so all the usual seashore delights are packed into a modest area. Portsmouth, which is pretty swish and historical, will show you some fancy good times, grand homes and even artistic expression. Hampden Beach is a squalid playground, like Jersey's boardwalks, teeming and chockablock. the festival had attracted a crowd. we could've parked free and taken a shuttle in but wanted to pass thru. past, that is, the $10 municipal parking and $20 free enterprise opportunities. much car traffic and the streets were full of meandering pedestrians. we last ventured here in the winter, during a snowstorm, with a hard bitter wind blowing. it was a ghost town. now (but not for much longer)... people were still on the beach tho lightning flashes could be seen in the distance. and the panoply of delights that caught the eye: karaoke 7 nights a week, tattoo parlours (ooo, parlour, how grand), legal fireworks stores. and I believe you could find yourself a beer here and there. and fried clams. this area is part of the war zone between Taxachusetts and Live Free or Die. no sales tax in NH, and the state run liquor stores supposedly can save you money. also tobacco products are taxed less. I'm not sure you always save by going north, but if you are there for your much needed supply of fireworks, I guess it can all work out. it really was the body electric going on, people in a parade of eat, drink and be merrie. it looked like too much work: we gave the festival a pass. which is okay with me, fish is anathema for me. I can eat fish, and sometimes can even 'like' it, but I just don't want to. we moseyed to the town of Hampden, which is more sedate, pretty even. oh, I didn't mench the resort we passed. it appeared to be an inn, with a donut shop attached, perhaps a restaurant too, all packed in this little building. you'd never need to leave. and don't forget the $200,000 1 bedroom condo sort've near the beach and definitely near every manner of available noise and fun time ruction in the area. we ate at a restaurant we'd hit the last time thru. it is an inn of considerably more extent than that resort. there was a 35 minute wait at the main dining room, which meant that Erin would completely die from hunger before even seeing a menu. they said we could try the lounge, which indeed, after a moment's wait, offered up a table. the lounge was your basic sports bar, with 6 tvs tuned each to different college football games, and 1 Red Sox game. same menu. I don't know how it became the thing to serve up such hyper distraction--the tiresome thump of 'Benny and the Jets' serenaded us as well--but it's de rigueur. I rather like it, in small doses. swift-footed Ellsbury Jacoby lofts a 1st inning fly to leftfield, then sparky Dustin Pedroia pokes a sharp single past the 3rd baseman then David 'Big Papi' Ortiz strokes one into the stands of Camden Yard, where everyone seems to be wearing Red Sox garb. but someone went yard on Dice-K on about his 5th pitch and our scrappy team went down in defeat. not that we were there beyond that meatball that Matzusaka served up. the temperature dropped 20 degrees whilst we roamed. flickers of lightning and barely discernible thunder thru the night, and much needed rain. poetry is everywhere.

just received The Light Sang as it Left Your Eyes by Eileen Tabios (Marsh Hawk 2007). it is compellingly subtitled 'Our Autobiography'. the cover consists of Warholian reverberations of 2 images: Eileen and her father. one infers that the our of the subtitle refers to father and child. which, surely, it does; it's a lovely embrace. Eileen goes it further, tho, by linking herself to the daughter of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos, who shares Eileen's birthday. just to add a neat Guy Davenport-like coincidence, the birthday is September 11. all this I gleaned from my first scantest scan. I intend no review at this time, and am limited just now as Beth is currently in the process of reading the book (she cooked, hence I washed dishes, hence she had 1st dibs). (what's a dib, btw, and is a plurality thereof really somehow better?). I am inspired to write a few Tabiosian words, generalities upon the phenomenon. Eileen has invented, I here declare, a new genre, which might be called Gallimaufry, or, perhaps, And The Kitchen Sink. I chose those terms for their sense of inclusion and variety. like her previous brick, I Take Thee, English, for My Beloved (Marsh Hawk), Eileen utilizes stylistic variety: prose, hay(na)ku, collaboration, etc. I like how process is so close to the surface. and she does not divorce her blog writing and connections from her poetry. which, too, proposes process as a central energy of the work. that how the poem and book arrived to its life is as important as what its life 'is'. this is consistent with the poets who interest me. I don't mean in the sense of I went to Yaddo and breathed the free air sort of processual undertaking. I mean Eileen lets ideas happen, gives them free rein in the composition. Eileen's gestures around 'the subject' form a space that is the subject. all this is evident by early fresh glances. I look forward to digging in in earnest.

so now I'm reading American Bloomsbury by Susan Cheever (Simon and Schuster 2006). it's about those famous folk of Concord, down the road. the Bloomsbury reference is probably apt, a buzzing little socio-artistic conclave. I haven't tried too hard but the only one of interest to me among the Bloomsburies is Virginia. I catch a more righteous buzz from Concordia (as I think Bronson called the town). the interrelationships and interconnections of those American eccentrics is fascinating. it's hard to avoid a slavish respect, see the worth of these people without exceeding. Bronson Alcott resembled his friend Henry James Sr, loaded with ideas but lacking in practicalities. tho there's a picture of him sitting on a bench with some apples, and the caption indicates that Bronson would offer apples to passersby, who then were required to listen to his theories (he said hi like the spider to the fly). I didn't know Thoreau met Poe, and have no idea how that would have turned out. I read a bio of Whitman that rendered Thoreau's visit to Whitman as a competition of sorts, giving victory to Whitman for having it more together. which I think meant more boldly confident in his assertions. whatever. it's funny to think of this village of teeming intellectual curiosity since now the town is no such thing. it is a well-heeled, very pretty town with wonderfully dreamy homes but whatever intellectual ruction exists is kept indoors. as is the case mostwhere in the US. utopia now has more to do with nice lawns and stock options than anything Fruitlands or Brook Farm might've aimed for. why isn't there intellectual fervour? hm.

fountain

fountain, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

this n that. read The Godfather by Mario Puzo. I've seen the movie bunches of time tho not recently. it's pretty faithful to the book. not surprising as Puzo wrote the screenplay with Coppola. much of the movie's dialogue (which is good) comes straight from the book. Coppola wisely excised some superfluities. Sonny's lover, hardly a plot point in the movie, pointlessly pairs with a Vegas surgeon, and there's overmuch of Johhny Langone too. tho it is intimated in the movie that Luca Brasi is a terror, all we see is a big lug. he doesn't do much narratively in the book, but stories are told of his viciousness, very creepy. Coppola got the right actors for the job. I have no idea if Abe Vigoga or the guy who played Clemenza are what you call good actors, they fit in the movie. James Caan, Robert Duval and the guy who played Solozzo are perfect. Diane Keaton in the movie and Kay in the book suck life from the respective works. the horse head scene in the book is surprisingly undersplayed. in teh book, Woltz thinks logically that if these people are willing to kill a $600,000 horse, they might mean business. the movie plays more on the horror. the dramatic highpoint of the movie is the attack on the 5 families. in the book Puzo is just tying up loose ends. think of Lord of the Rings, where it seems like they didn't have the book handy when they were working up the script. The Godfather stays true to the book, probably because there's so much life in the tale and the people. I also watched Dracula, Bela Lugosi's version. being one of those movies that I saw as a child, it will always have its authenticity as a horror flick. the stiff stage acting works oddly in it favour, everyone seems transfixed. Lugosi is extremely mannered and that bemused smile of his really unsettles. when he vamps out, he always does so slo-mo, his hands tensely poised. he draws slowly towards his victim and just as you start to get a sexual vibe, the scene changes. the book is quite rollicking, which I didn't expect. the movie skipped much of the book's plot, really just made it a star vehicle for Lugosi. Coppola's version sticks close with the book. whereas the Lugosi vehicle gains atmosphere via dry ice, Coppola pulls out all the tools of movie magic, to little more effect. he's got Gary Oldham and Anthony Hopkins hamming it up, Keanu Reeves and Winona Ryder barely registering, but Stoker's plot (not always making sense) bounds long. worth watching if not respecting. my father saw the play some time late in Lugosi's career when morphine had I guess taken its toll and Lugosi was playing an exaggerated imitation of himself. Lugosi in Plan 9 is almost funny, but more tragic really. it's an artist thing in which the manners of the art remain but not the soul. I also watched 300 again. I found myself wanting to see its visual flair, its translation of comix art to cinema. the democratic pieties are plangent. it comes down to the split between those willing to work on their abs and pecs and those not. and who wouldn't want to get out the spear and sword and get some hearty exercise? I scanned the graphic novel some time ago and found it faithfully rendered by the movie and low octane as a reading enterprise. it's a preposterous story but transmogrified into a cinematic experience, it has some gumption. with its same old comix artwork, the book hasn't much to offer.

randon DAYS POEM excerpt

philosophic kindred roll mild rocks over roadways stretching imaginative loggerheads for the matter of study. noodling on capricious keyboard, which resounds, bumping maximum with blithe whimsy, steely kisses from a wrenching moment and then some. how language holds still, with its alerts aligned and the matter craning for attention. this is no cloister or if the snow melts, if that damn groundhog from foreign clime, if the garden seed catalogue, and if there is time, or so we say. we work hard at trying to find. any sentence can be finished.--Days Poem, vol. 2, sec. 222, p 5

I like looking at Sitemeter's stats for this blog to see whence the myriad readership comes. I've been much surprised by the uncommon number of folks who arrive via Google search on 'fisher cats', almost as many as on 'awesome poet" and 'beloved by all". well as it happens, at the top of said Google search are 3 images of fishers. I linked to the middle one when some fishers were noising about nearby a year ago last may. click the picture and you arrive at my archived fisher post, not the picture itself. just so you, dear and talented Reader, know: I m not a fisher expert, I didn't take the picture, I didn't even steal it. but welcome to FISHER CAT FISHER CAT FISHER CAT Heaven on the Net. since you've arrived, I hope you buy my book. it's got all the modern conveniences including author bio, isbn number, title page (with big letters!!!) and, for those times when you need to cite, numbered pages. makes a great gift.

read the intro to A Book of PROPHECHIES by John Wieners from Bootstrap Productions and began a short memoir of Creeley by [author name here] from Pressed Wafer, 2 of the recently dead/dearly departed. I 'met' Creeley 35 years ago at Franconia College, a stirring tale that, tho I must've recounted it here before, bears repeating. those who didn't turn out for other readings showed for this one. it was something of a homecoming for Creeley, who lived a few miles away back in his chicken tending days when he began corresponding with Olson. I didn't think he read especially well as I didn't when he read in Boston in 2000. he read a considerable chunk of a prose piece, which I've never read except for the chunk published in This. I believe the idea of Creeley writing prose excited me then but I'm not sure I absorbed much of the work. after the reading was a party at Robert Greniers, and rather than just the school's student writers, much of the school's community attended. during the course of which Grenier attempted to introduce me to Creeley. 3 times Grenier said something like Bob, I'd like you to meet... then someone would speak to Creeley, or he'd suddenly wonder what was on the record player or whatever. this amused rather than upset me as Creeley was clearly in another state. as was I, adrenalized by the event and, oddly, a commanding sense of myself as a writer. at some point Creeley sat near me. he was full of energy. he managed to make the record player skip, which set him to doing that intentionally by stomping his feet. this evolved into hand clapping. I joined him in the clapping. we syncopated quite intently. intently as well he looked at me, which I returned. an odd little meeting, I daresay. no words were exchanged. Wieners I never met. he brings the Venn diagram of art and illness into a perspective. note that I said a.a clinician would regard Wieners differently from how a poet would regard him. both views, or neither, are 'true'. the ravings of madness are often poetic, but poetry isn't madness. with Wieners, one faces the border of that, the shared space of the Venn balloons. I mean, with Wieners, the sense of that is strong. Creeley's interesting behaviour that night owed something (I'm totally guessing) to drugs or alcohol, but I imbibed neither yet was running on some transporting energy too. somehow after the party I ended up with several people I hardly knew. we 1st climbed onto this rock ledge overlooking Profile Lake (above which the Old Man in the Mountain used to loom) called the Poet's Seat or something like. full moon over the lake, as my memory wants to hold it. and after that, an all night trip to Montreal, and back. hm. yesterday we took food and ate dinner at Walden. the water level had finally receded so that the lower paths were open again. Erin had a disposable underwater camera that he wanted to try out. mallards floated hither and yon. some teens were throwing pebbles at the ducks not out of meanness but because they freaked them out. imagine! a woman called out, I'm swimming with the ducks! I don't know why I connect our latest visit to Walden to those poets. I hadn't thought of that view from the Poet's Seat in a long while. and the Old Man is gone, as is the school, both the institution and the building. Thoreau isn't there, but we remember him. some of what we remember is a craziness, likewise how we recall Dickinson, most writers. I shorely don't want to diagnose. we treat of the expressions and how those expressions grow and make sense. had an intro gotten thru to Creeley, the conversation, my part, would be something like, um, I like Pieces, etc. clapping hands to "Can You Hear Me Knocking" maybe is more a meeting, not to say Creeley had a 2nd thought about it. it all matters.

a Unitarian church stands across the street from us. its bell tolls hourly, but I've already come to hardly notice. altho today, starting around 5pm, it kept ringing for maybe 30 minutes. it may be a war protest, best guess, tho no one was outside on the green to make the point. the church now sports a banner on the side proclaiming the virtues of diversity. which is white middle class suburban talkspeak for what, exactly? I grew up in the Unitarian church, so I claim the right to throw stones. when Beth and I 1st married, we thunk as how the church would be a good thing for Erin, as a social vector, if nothing else. my father, at the time, was still attending church, as he did responsibly for some 50 years. I had long since lost any interest in the church beyond the physical structure itself, a neat airy contemplative space, but a place where Erin could meet kids was an important consideration. the minister, who married us, told Beth that the church's youth group wasn't what you might call receptive to, well, anyone. that this new kid, Erin, might not be welcomed for reasons of his being, well, the new kid. or shit like that. at the time the church seethed with a brouhaha concerning whether or not to have a sign welcoming gays. the result of the battle was a temporary invitation to any stray gays who needed an insincere home where they could be welcomed for who they are, for a while. honest, it played just like that. the Unitarians might scare up some anti-war sentiment but the diversity thing is just a sham. it is words as defensive maneuver. as I said, my father was a long time member of the church. the church did little when he could no longer manage attending church. periodically a couple of church members would officially count coup on him, you know, tag the old guy, reap Unitarian karma points. I hated it. especially when, overwhelmed, I called to see if the church could provide any relief for a caregiver of one of their members (negatory on that one, good buddy). so that banner across the street, with the central casting unit of shiny diversity smiling at all, brings an anger to me. there was never a moral structure involved in the church that I knew. words glazed motive. talk is cheap. Walt Whitman is almost a Unitarian minister, except for an essential sincerity that trumps his showboat nature. I mean, when he invokes a picture of him give succour to a runaway slave, he manages to keep the political moment true. yes, I realize he maintains a hovering erotic element, natheless there's something gosh darn true in the exploit of his words. for all his bluster, he's on to something. as poet, there is pathfinding to do. always. the Unitarian syndrome is only for followers. the ecstatic intent of a singular path provides a grace of reflection that a Unitarian blowhard doesn't bother with. I guess I got my dukes up. that sanitary banner, and the flags of diversity adorning the nifty little church garden, just don't get the work done.

I swept some of the typos from the post below. I admit to an antic rush as I post to the blog. especially when I am fading towards sleep, as often is the case. I rather like the lightheaded sloppiness of such a process, but am not agin cleaning up the work a bit. I feel the need to report this, just so's you don't think I can't write a nifty sentence if pressed.

ah, let me ruminate... yesterday, Beth noticed that the nest of wrens in the eaves of our porch were more noticeable: you could see their little heads sticking up. bumptious artisan that I am, I grabbed my camera. 1st picture, I held the camera over my head, and got evidence of the wrenlings but hardly a great shot. I climbed onto the railing and managed 2 more shots. the flash went off both times, which I rued as being rude. as I attempted a better position, one of the chicks levitated, as it seemed, from the nest and... well, it plummetted. it was like a flight, resembling (too) maple tree seeds, what are they called? the things you, as a kid, might've split and stuck to your nose. or maybe you didn't... anyway, that whirligig downward spin. thud. I felt like I was just injected with Michael Vick's soul, I mean, did I need to assault the nest for the sake of some half-assed photograph? Beth told me to return it to the nest. we have a friend of considerable ornithological expertise (a bird, wren maybe, was named by him(!!!)) who asserts that it aint nothing to do so, won't taint the little ones. so I tried to capture the wee bit of bird. it looked a little stunned but my agitation and clumsiness as I tried to collect it were enough to send it skittering. its skittering could fairly be placed in the category of flight. Beth, watching, finally said let it go. mom and pop were vocally about. I felt rather like crud but released from the effort. I took my guilty feelings elsewhere but soon Beth came to say that the other 2 chicks left the nest. mother wren had corralled the 3 and the learning process was go. okay, so this long nature study really wants to be about writing. about poetry even. because think of the flux of feelings involved, and how a writer comprises such. furthermore the symbolic 'facts' that spring up. okay, yeah so well like, we accept poetry as a transformation, don't we? or translation. we see words as experience. sometimes this just means congestive heart failure. too much fluid overfills the possible breath. in this metaphor, the fluid is a potent sentiment. o love! o death! o inadequacy! writers try to wring the bejesus out of that sentimental event. the writer thinks: I felt something and must share... this is a pet called Bad Poetry. it's the conscious clicking of gears that is the trouble. Blake's Songs of In and Ex aren't thunk thru positions in sentiment, they are rare scrapings of essential skin. likewise the mosquito bite clarity of Dickinson. I'm not trying to put up barriers here, in matters of canon or style. the event of those chicks taking flight was brusque monstrance of momentum. you have your own select gathering. 2 centuries ago, Keats had his nightingle. terms differ now. plenty of writers still posit central motifs like, say, chicks floundering into flight (or death). but there's a less direct approach now. my being situates in the motivation factor, which is emotional, sometimes stupidly enthralled with the peopled response. I shan't write a poem that baldly places wren and me in poetic 2-step, I've weeded that impulse from my directive. that doesn't mean I wasn't affected. and poetry, I daresay, springs from that very fount. still, I mean. e'en tho I might dodge the possible exploit of emotive meaning, that I might proceed with procedures, that I might seem to hand the steering wheel to another driver. th energy transfer occurs, even if the lofty sentiments that Sam'l Johnson asserted as poetic positive aren't painted on this writer's forehead. this morning, as I left for work, a wren chick sprung from under the porch and lighted on the car. a wee frailty building life. it survived its 1st lonesome night in the world of predators, there's the one fact. I think I look at birds because they are of The Poetry. because they are tonic note in some chord of which my writing somehow... I don't mean nature poetry or that, I mean the instance of their fact, read by me. those instances of facts could be anything, o rare writer, anything that brings you to bear the weight. I'm saying poetry is sprung from the world but not that it details the world's distractions. I'm not suggesting a right poetry, only noting a means and process. I could, this night, write a poem involved in all the spurts of emotional response that arose as I engaged the bird moment, or have done it yestreen. yatta yatta yatta. hey, let's get rid of the obvious. the obvious has done its job. let's see poetry go beyond pious NYers identifying their moments in the flux. for instance. and so on. metaphors are nice until they die. similes need to be trimmed daily. why are you involved in your writing? you there, I mean, the one with all the words in your head. why are those yourwords? I posit no answers, but like how things bump up against, in words and all.

I say we a lot, and I'm sticking with it.We are still putting things in their place. books have yet to be unpacked. reading Faulkner and the latest issue of Tricycle (Buddhist mag), c'est ca. who reads books, anyway? well, if reading books soaks your teabag, why not get Days Poem. it was written with the belief that Walden Pond, bears, Henry Thoreau, Fu Manchu, Nepal and hobos all exist. it was written with love. we are now going there regularly, Walden, that is. it makes sense. so anyway, in lieu of reading, we watched Twister again last night. it holds up well. that's a thing about movies. many, I find, wear out. after a few viewings I tend to fast froward (typo alert! I retain it because how often will froward show up in anything I write???), or want to, to the nifty bits. Twister remains quite compelling visually, even tho some of the effects look a little like last week. I love the sense of place. somehow, the movie makes Oklahoma in the summer seem like a jolly wonderful place. oh those lovely farmhouses and lush cornfields, and I'm sure it doesn't get hot in Oklahoma in the summer time. the camera treats all the characters quite amiably, even what's his name as the Snidely Whiplash of tornado chasers. the antic crew of good guys is a fun ensemble of Hollywood almost nobodies who each has a fully defined 2-dimensional character to play with. funny to see Philip Seymour Hoffman before he became Capote (which I haven't seen but I'm sure his transformation is blah blah blah breathtaking). while Helen Hunt, Bill Paxton and Jami Gertz play their de rigueur pas de trois, tornadoes come and go. it works. the wonderland of Oklahoma brims alive with twisters. altho Helen Hunt has a mission thru out the film, the tornadoes never become vengeful murderers, as Hollywood movies tend to track. timely laughs lift nicely, most notably near the end when Helen and Bill enter a barn for protection, only to see scads of pointy scythes and pitch forks rocking in the building breeze. this may be as close to twisters as I'll ever get. soon I shall read poetry again, soon write.

the simpsons

the simpsons, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

a blast

a blast, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

angular

angular, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

cross walk

cross walk, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

nuclear Walden moment

nuclear Walden moment, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

Antic View now up to installment 129. I think this is useful mind muddle. Jeff Harrison is a sui generis whose conceptual cogitations provoke useful routes and branches. I think my own humble application toward the confusion is worth reading, but I'll put the trumpet down now. I hate to think a Jim Behrle nerve tonic is "what it's about". I mean, okay, social program molds our movements, but I hope our thoughts are freer. which is to say, writers not just preening but risking to state the tentative nature of the exacting process is worth readership. the spectacle of whingeing, of course, may be more enticing.

my mind drifted to thoughts of Walden and Thoreau today when any chance arose. there aren't a lot of natural swimming holes hereabouts, so Walden shimmers with that attribute. my family aimed elsewhere for swimming excursions, as I was growing up. my grandmother lived in the town of Townsend, on the NH border, so we went there. the VFW kept up a swimming area across the street from the little store my grandmother had there. saturday nights thru the summer there were chicken barbecues with a band concert after. it was like Mayberry, or one of Mark Twain's stray warm memories of youth. a few years ago Beth and I were coming back from western Mass and made our way to the swimming hole. the river was gone, gone I tell you. only the bare bones of the band box remained of, what, my youth? the river, no major artery, had apparently been diverted. my friend grew up in Concord and fondly remembers the cement pier that stretched into the water of Walden, perfect for leaping into the water from. I always considered that thing monstrous, but I saw with different eyes than my friend. just as the many visitors to Walden see different uses. as Beth and I walked along one time, we unavoidably heard a conversation between a man in the water and one on shore. the one in the water was opining about the Jungian qualities of swimming. etc, as you might imagine. and sure, some people want to enact an Annie Dillard moment. I mean that kind of self-conscious circumspection that accounts for a great deal of nature writing. I demarcate a difference in Thoreau, cheer me on at your pleasure. sure he was a hearty blowhard, insofar as he was loaded to the gills with aphoristic concentrations. I think he's hilarious and fresh air often, but still, you know, he could get caught up in a John Brown mystique. I forgive him, as I should forgive all such eager failings in judgment. but I see conviction in his process, or more aptly: actions in his words rather than words in his actions. the Annie Dillard sort of precognitive philosophizing is thoughtfully glib. which doesn't sound like I'm making sense. I mean something about how the subject jolts her expression, like her thinking is controlled by the structure of essay, and not in Montaigne's embracing sense (whose effort of comprehensive consideration reminds me of Thoreau). rather, Dillard defines territories of populated worth. I offer Dillard only as an example of a collective of popular, or populist, writing. and maybe why I give Thoreau the nod is simply the palpable example of his cabin (by which I mean the replica sitting there near the parking lot, a couple hundred yards from the actual site of his cabin). that replica offers a wonderful, perhaps useful, picture. room enough for a bed, a desk and a chair. for all that, a kindly fireplace, and an open, brimming door. I see this as a vision of a writer. there would be room for that handful of books, more accurately that armful. say ten essential books. we just moved, as I've said. our books are in boxes, may remain thus for a while. which ones will call for me? as a writer, what books do I need? a writer writes. a writer is not a NYC bar. a writer is not a school or tenure track or political position. you know where this is going. a writer efforts letters, words and sounds. that uncluttered cabin is so much writing. it is the Bhagavad-Gita played as a trumpet. it is a walk out and about transmogrified into letters surrounding words. Walden Pond is a movie only vaguely starring the glacial pothole itself. people go there to exercise, to play, to relax, to talk, to eat, to imbibe some rarity of thought or mood, and all of this is right. the writer has this clean box of a room and the mechanism to enter the written motion. think of Thoreau with his outlook on the pond. his little desk upon which he writes his journal, tinged with the loss of his brother. I don't mean to make hero of Thoreau any more than call Walden Eden. neither assertion would be useful. Walden has just been particularized, and Thoreau is just another candidate in the flush. how crucial to remember this! we write poems not as proofs or definitions. we write what is with us, in our cabin, in the squared resonance of our place, here, now. if Don Henley had not come along, Walden would not be here? I don't know. I just want to stay with the particulars of the place. the one here and now, with all the words involved.

we've decided to make Walden Pond our go to place, it being convenient for said purpose. purchased a season ticket, even (good at all national parks. no reason really to consider it sanctified but the place is. sunday we decided to eat dinner there. well, the place was packed. in fact, it only just reopened when we arrived at 5:30: attendance at Walden's plush wateriness is strictly limited. so the only perch we could find was by the road to the boat ramp. a dusty place indeed. I took a dip and while doing so 2 pairs of mallards paddled close by. they moved purposefully toward I don't know what. not much after, they moved purposefully away. the sense of this idyllic postcard held fiercely in place (against the onslaught of blighty progress) is strong. but the sun, oh, it sinks into the trees to the west in spacious loveliness. I cannot tell you how uplifting it used to be to cycle by on my way home from work years ago. just that glimpse as I raced to the intersection with rt 2. yesterday we just swam. I don't really swim, to be honest. I never cottoned to the immediate collection of water in my ear. to be further honest, I am unnerved by the extent of nothingness below me when I go into deep water. fathomless death or some such. I think of Titanic and Perfect Storm and Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald (I just refound that song, by Gordon Lightfoot. I'd assumed it was about some, say, 19th century disaster but in fact Lightfoot's song was tantamount to a news report, came out within a year of the sinking of the freighter on Lake Superior). so I don't swim so well. I took a movie recently of a swarm of swimmers plying their effort in a circumnavigation. nothing that Thoreau imagined, I wot. yesterday the water was like bathwater. mallards, 3 pair, were a mite annoyed at our appearance in their bailiwick. it is a poetry, you see, to see a place as a place, as a center, as something definitive. we live in a new place, as I have reported. it has a porch. the porch is all the world. when we first saw the porch, which looks onto the town green and the unavoidable Unitarian church, it was festooned with mock orange blossoms and a reliable sun-and-verdure motet. I'm not faking the poetry. we sit on the garden bench that I bought long ago, drink beer, and tune in to the traffic, the wrens and house sparrows in the mock orange and everywhere else, the failing sunlight, and gulping torrent of frog voices, etc: ferlies and marvels. is poetry a place? isn't Thoreau writing that poetry, as he rambles and preens about his wild land of theories? isn't Dickenson, in the flickering garden choices of her own written word? it is a blasting simplicity, and yet... I mean, even Faulkner, who could be a circus show, he does include that position of place within the structure of poetic response. yes, it all gets hokey, with Don Henley presiding over some vision of sanctified, and one wants to feel better than the eager touring parties who come merely to splash, yet that all goes beyond the point. the point is a drop of water. poetry, in that drop.

this blog has seen little of my consummate verbiage lately so I take this sunday evening to produce some brain-scrapings for your delectation. we have, as I did mench, moved, down the road a piece. we remain in the luxury of our boxes but made a goodly effort today at emptying a few. we situate across the street from the town green and the inescapable Unitarian church there. I was born into a Unitarian church but it gave me nothing, tho I liked the church building as a bright meditative space. my birthday was wednesday. I share it with Herman Melville, William Clark, and Jerry Garcia, probably others. there is no reason to associate myself with them, but let me anyway. Melville is a wonder, certainly in his greatness (Moby Dick) but also in his struggles. Lewis and Clark are a trope that has lost nothing for me. a sense of creative adventure in that journey. I'm planning to write a rockopera about the Corps of Discovery, done as an hommage to Jerry. Madonna would be wonderful as Sacagawea. yesterday was the birthday of Robert Grenier, Roger Clemens and Percy Bysshe Shelley. of course Clemens stinks, the greedy crumb bum, but the other 2 pulsate. one time at Franconia College I was in a room with Grenier and another person, just the 3 of us. somehow birthdays came up, and it was revealed that mine was 8/1, Grenier 8/4, and the other person 8/3. well I was born in the Year of the Dragon and according to all horoscopic evidence I'm a pretty wonderful person. you could look it up. we went to Walden twice today. 1st time, Beth and I circumambulated its verdant gleam. the 2nd time we brought foodstuffs at dinner time. the parking lot had just reopened when we arrived. attendance amidst the pond's coconut tanning creme aroma is kept strictly in hand. a sign explains the wherefore of the pond's high water level: porous pavement. rain seeps thru the pavement instead of running off. less erosion, thus. because of the rise in water level there remains little of what you'd call beach. benches that used to line the wall bordering part of the pond are now underwater. that's so freaky! I aint hardly read nuthin' lately, books have yet to be released from their limbo. in boxing books I happened upon Sound and Fury, which I am slowly rereading. Faulkner is so wound up in his mythology, which is a good and bad thing. his weak novels are caricatures, of Faulkner, of the South (a South he invented, or people believe he contributed to the American psyche). in S&F, he's clearer on the mythic extent, it feels close to home. when he overburdens the furious tragic element, and the dogma of Southern decrepitude, he sucks out loud, to put it baldly. yoiu can tell him I said so. in my edition, S&F is aptly offered with As I Lay Dying. which is a grisly comedy that should have been made into a film by some ardent and exacting filmmaker. I mean, it is funny the way Goodfellas is funny, and maybe Scorsese would be the one to do justice to this aweful and compelling story. Madonna would be great as the corpse. and my ramble report endeth here...

alien space pod hatching facility

alien space pod hatching facility, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

curb

curb, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

train time

train time, originally uploaded by allen_bramhall.

in the Good Taste is Timeless Dept., saw a kindergarten called Magic Touch. having remarked that, let's not go there.

we're in the midst of moving, just down the street but still, so I'm in no condition for one of my typically brilliant posts. in lieu of same, I offer Vanilla Fudge, part of my Youtube time wastage. they made a name for themselves in the 60s (harbinger of the 70, which led to the 80s, I believe) by whiteboying soul songs, substituting muscle for inflection. quite a few of their songs are in a time signature called sludge, but here we have a bit more energy. the drummer could give Bonzo Bonham a run for heavy hands. the drama tires me, tho, as does the singer's hand gestures. they give a pretty thunderous application of sound, but strangely anemic for all that flexing. I guess i should have pointed to this version. ah yes, Doc Strange on bass. god, it's like bad poetry. it's great to see such great dancing, too. this IS poetry, right here, fresh 2007 imitation soul. I mean, this kind of inflated crap's pretty common in the poetryworld, yes?