DISILLUSIONMENT OF TEN O'CLOCK
—Wallace Stevens
The houses are haunted
By white night-gowns.
None are green,
Or purple with green rings,
Or green with yellow rings,
Or yellow with blue rings.
None of them are strange,
With socks of lace
And beaded ceintures.
People are not going
To dream of baboons and periwinkles.
Only, here and there, an old sailor,
Drunk and asleep in his boots,
Catches tigers
In red weather.
______________________
So how were your dreams last night? Is your house haunted with white nightgowns—or are they in technicolor?
My house is haunted with snakes—the bones and teeth of issue #7, to be precise, and stacks of chaps for Ron Tranquilla's reading and book release tonight (7:30 at The Book Collector). Also premiering at the reading tonight will be Todd Cirillo's littlesnake broadside, Another Heart Dancing in the Flames.
Brad Buchanan will be hosting an open mike poetry reading at the
Barnes & Noble in Citrus Heights (6111 Sunrise Blvd.) this Friday, Sept. 2 at 7:00pm. Bring your own work and a friend!
Supanove (Noah Hayes) writes: Music and Poetry Series is back in full affect at Luna’s Café (1414 16th St., Sac.), beginning this Saturday. September will be featuring Supercaliflowlinguists, a poetry super-group that has been reppin in the poetry scene individually since the Blue Room Days at the now faded Jazzmen’s Art of Pasta. This group features Cleo Cartell, Khiry Malik, Ike Torres. The doors open at 7pm. with poetry beginning at 8pm. The open mic list will be in affect as usual and everyone who is brave enough to sign up is guaranteed time on the mic. So bring your poetry, music, instruments, jokes—anything you want to share!
More from Wallace Stevens:
EARTHY ANECDOTE
—Wallace Stevens
Every time the bucks went clattering
Over Oklahoma
A firecat bristled in the way.
Wherever they went,
They went clattering,
Until they swerved
In a swift, circular line
To the right,
Because of the firecat.
Or until they swerved
In a swift, circular line
To the left,
Because of the firecat.
The bucks clattered.
The firecat went leaping,
To the right, to the left,
And
Bristled in the way.
Later, the firecat closed his bright eyes
And slept.
_____________________
Thanks, Wally!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
"Don't force poems to let go of limbo..."
THE DEAD IN FROCK COATS
—Carlos Drummond de Andrade
In the corner of the living room was an album of unbearable photos,
many meters high and infinite minutes old,
over which everyone leaned
making fun of the dead in frock coats.
Then a worm began to chew the indifferent coats,
the pages, the inscriptions, and even the dust on the pictures.
The only thing it did not chew was the everlasting sob of life that broke
and broke from those pages.
_______________________
BOY CRYING IN THE NIGHT
—Carlos Drummond de Andrade
In the warm, humid night, noiseless and dead, a boy cries.
His crying behind the wall, the light behind the window
are lost in the shadow of muffled footsteps, of tired voices.
Yet the sound of medicine poured into a spoon can be heard.
A boy cries in the night, behind the wall, across the street,
far away a boy cries, in another city,
in another world, perhaps.
And I see the hand that llifts the spoon while the other holds the head,
and I see the slick thread run down the boy's chin,
and slip into the street, only a thread, and slip through the city.
And nobody else in the world exists but that boy crying.
_______________________
This is an excerpt from his "Looking For Poetry":
Enter the kingdom of words as if you were deaf.
Poems are there that want to be written.
They are dormant, but don't be let down,
their virginal surfaces are fresh and serene.
They are alone and mute, in dictionary condition.
Live with your poems before you write them.
If they're vague, be patient. If they offend, be calm.
Wait untiil each one comes into its own and demolishes
with its command of words
and its command of silence.
Don't force poems to let go of limbo.
Don't pick up lost poems from the ground.
Don't fawn over poems. Accept them
as you would their final and definitive form,
distilled in space.
________________________
For years, I've had "Don't force poems to let go of limbo" tacked up on my wall. But it's a constant struggle...
B.L. Kennedy writes: Linda Thorell, myself and our organization T.A.G. (The Archives Group) have been funded at 85% by Sacramento Metropolitan Arts Council and the ArtScapes Grant Program to do our project. As you know, the project is to do a two-disc DVD on poetry in Sacramento circa 1960 to 2005.
Congrats, Bari and Linda!
And don't forget tomorrow night's special Rattle-read and book release party at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sac, 7:30pm: Ron Tranquilla: An Ocean-Front Hotel Room.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
—Carlos Drummond de Andrade
In the corner of the living room was an album of unbearable photos,
many meters high and infinite minutes old,
over which everyone leaned
making fun of the dead in frock coats.
Then a worm began to chew the indifferent coats,
the pages, the inscriptions, and even the dust on the pictures.
The only thing it did not chew was the everlasting sob of life that broke
and broke from those pages.
_______________________
BOY CRYING IN THE NIGHT
—Carlos Drummond de Andrade
In the warm, humid night, noiseless and dead, a boy cries.
His crying behind the wall, the light behind the window
are lost in the shadow of muffled footsteps, of tired voices.
Yet the sound of medicine poured into a spoon can be heard.
A boy cries in the night, behind the wall, across the street,
far away a boy cries, in another city,
in another world, perhaps.
And I see the hand that llifts the spoon while the other holds the head,
and I see the slick thread run down the boy's chin,
and slip into the street, only a thread, and slip through the city.
And nobody else in the world exists but that boy crying.
_______________________
This is an excerpt from his "Looking For Poetry":
Enter the kingdom of words as if you were deaf.
Poems are there that want to be written.
They are dormant, but don't be let down,
their virginal surfaces are fresh and serene.
They are alone and mute, in dictionary condition.
Live with your poems before you write them.
If they're vague, be patient. If they offend, be calm.
Wait untiil each one comes into its own and demolishes
with its command of words
and its command of silence.
Don't force poems to let go of limbo.
Don't pick up lost poems from the ground.
Don't fawn over poems. Accept them
as you would their final and definitive form,
distilled in space.
________________________
For years, I've had "Don't force poems to let go of limbo" tacked up on my wall. But it's a constant struggle...
B.L. Kennedy writes: Linda Thorell, myself and our organization T.A.G. (The Archives Group) have been funded at 85% by Sacramento Metropolitan Arts Council and the ArtScapes Grant Program to do our project. As you know, the project is to do a two-disc DVD on poetry in Sacramento circa 1960 to 2005.
Congrats, Bari and Linda!
And don't forget tomorrow night's special Rattle-read and book release party at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sac, 7:30pm: Ron Tranquilla: An Ocean-Front Hotel Room.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Monday, August 29, 2005
As If You'd Made Love With a Dolphin...
INTO THE GREAT MIST
—Abdulah Sidran
Listen: how quietly
The tired Earth's hair is turning grey.
The World decamps into the great mist.
This island, this razed field, sinks away.
And when they are sunk
And changed into the slow seeds
These heads of ours will be swayed for a long time
By a thick wind, underground.
Only the words will survive—
Those words we never uttered—
And because of them (this is the marvel)
Our existence here will be long remembered.
Listen: how quietly
The tired Earth's hair is turning grey.
The World decamps into the great mist.
_____________________
That's by a Bosnian poet, from the collection, Scar on the Stone: Contemporary Poetry from Bosnia, edited by Chris Agee. Here's another:
PREGNANT GIRL
—Hadzem Hamdarevic
You feel sea-murmur, a buzzing April galop.
The waves are rumbustious greyhounds
but you are a full-fig garden.
Turn your eyes deepsea to the crimson-
and-tequila-sunrise rocks
where south wind swells the bellies of the sails.
The rippled-snakeskin wind is a black sailor
with a silver ear-hoop. Don't break out
in shame. Don't get any nearer pure blue.
Touch wild roots at high tide
as the sea grows gentler with itself and you,
and splashes your ankles. St George's hour
ticks over louder, for you. Young rain falls
on the softsilk membrane
where scarlet angels pucker
the umbilical cord.
As if you'd made love with a dolphin
in a sailor's dream; or mine.
_______________________
Grab a fistful of your poems and head on down to HQ tonight (25th & R, Sac.) to the Open Mic, 7:30pm. Fifth Mondays are always Open Mic at Sac. Poetry Center.
The latest issue of EKPHRASIS is out, including poems by our own Jeanine Stevens and Taylor Graham and Hannah Stein. This is a high-class national journal of poetry written to works of art, edited by Sacramentans Carol and Laverne Frith. Send for a copy: Frith Press, P.O. Box 161236, Sacramento, CA 95816. Or check out the website: www. hometown.aol.com/ekphrasis1.
Medusa loves mail; three days recently, the Kitchen has received Comments (see the bottom of each post). I wish you didn't have to sign up on Blogspot to be able to comment. But I'm very glad to see that others appreciate Longfellow (Colette Jonopulos; and Teresa McCourt, who wrote to kathykieth@hotmail.com), and thanks, Rhony Bhopla, for commenting on Basho, who is indeed credited with the birth of the Haiku.
As for Jim Jobe's comment, well, Ben Hiatt came at me at just the right time in my publishing sojourn, asking hard questions and knocking the sissy out of me. And finally he did let me do a rattlechap of his work, Rooting for the Rooster. Are you out there, you old snake? If you're watching, rattle your tail...
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
—Abdulah Sidran
Listen: how quietly
The tired Earth's hair is turning grey.
The World decamps into the great mist.
This island, this razed field, sinks away.
And when they are sunk
And changed into the slow seeds
These heads of ours will be swayed for a long time
By a thick wind, underground.
Only the words will survive—
Those words we never uttered—
And because of them (this is the marvel)
Our existence here will be long remembered.
Listen: how quietly
The tired Earth's hair is turning grey.
The World decamps into the great mist.
_____________________
That's by a Bosnian poet, from the collection, Scar on the Stone: Contemporary Poetry from Bosnia, edited by Chris Agee. Here's another:
PREGNANT GIRL
—Hadzem Hamdarevic
You feel sea-murmur, a buzzing April galop.
The waves are rumbustious greyhounds
but you are a full-fig garden.
Turn your eyes deepsea to the crimson-
and-tequila-sunrise rocks
where south wind swells the bellies of the sails.
The rippled-snakeskin wind is a black sailor
with a silver ear-hoop. Don't break out
in shame. Don't get any nearer pure blue.
Touch wild roots at high tide
as the sea grows gentler with itself and you,
and splashes your ankles. St George's hour
ticks over louder, for you. Young rain falls
on the softsilk membrane
where scarlet angels pucker
the umbilical cord.
As if you'd made love with a dolphin
in a sailor's dream; or mine.
_______________________
Grab a fistful of your poems and head on down to HQ tonight (25th & R, Sac.) to the Open Mic, 7:30pm. Fifth Mondays are always Open Mic at Sac. Poetry Center.
The latest issue of EKPHRASIS is out, including poems by our own Jeanine Stevens and Taylor Graham and Hannah Stein. This is a high-class national journal of poetry written to works of art, edited by Sacramentans Carol and Laverne Frith. Send for a copy: Frith Press, P.O. Box 161236, Sacramento, CA 95816. Or check out the website: www. hometown.aol.com/ekphrasis1.
Medusa loves mail; three days recently, the Kitchen has received Comments (see the bottom of each post). I wish you didn't have to sign up on Blogspot to be able to comment. But I'm very glad to see that others appreciate Longfellow (Colette Jonopulos; and Teresa McCourt, who wrote to kathykieth@hotmail.com), and thanks, Rhony Bhopla, for commenting on Basho, who is indeed credited with the birth of the Haiku.
As for Jim Jobe's comment, well, Ben Hiatt came at me at just the right time in my publishing sojourn, asking hard questions and knocking the sissy out of me. And finally he did let me do a rattlechap of his work, Rooting for the Rooster. Are you out there, you old snake? If you're watching, rattle your tail...
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Sunday, August 28, 2005
Basho, Anyone?
Five from Matsuo Kinsaku (1644-94), who changed his name to Basho in honor of a tree given to him by a disciple:
On the dead limb
squats a crow—
autumn night.
***
Yellow rose petals
thunder—
a waterfall.
***
Winter downpour—
even the monkey
needs a raincoat.
***
Butterfly—
wings curve into
white poppy.
***
How quiet—
locust-shrill
pierces rock.
__________________
Snakebytes, the e-newsletter from Rattlesnake Press, will be coming out today and tomorrow. Two releases this week: littlesnake broadside #15 from Todd Cirillo (Another Heart Dancing in the Flames) and Rattlechap #17 from Ron Tranquilla (An Ocean-Front Hotel Room). (Don't forget Ron's reading Wednesday at The Book Collector, 7:30pm.) Snake 7 will "hit the stands" after Labor Day, as will littlesnake broadside #16 from Irene Lipshin. Good Lord—I better hang up here and get to work!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
On the dead limb
squats a crow—
autumn night.
***
Yellow rose petals
thunder—
a waterfall.
***
Winter downpour—
even the monkey
needs a raincoat.
***
Butterfly—
wings curve into
white poppy.
***
How quiet—
locust-shrill
pierces rock.
__________________
Snakebytes, the e-newsletter from Rattlesnake Press, will be coming out today and tomorrow. Two releases this week: littlesnake broadside #15 from Todd Cirillo (Another Heart Dancing in the Flames) and Rattlechap #17 from Ron Tranquilla (An Ocean-Front Hotel Room). (Don't forget Ron's reading Wednesday at The Book Collector, 7:30pm.) Snake 7 will "hit the stands" after Labor Day, as will littlesnake broadside #16 from Irene Lipshin. Good Lord—I better hang up here and get to work!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Saturday, August 27, 2005
Jones-in' for Longfellow, One
I confess, I have a thing for Longfellow—which is politically incorrect, I know. Still, the man could tell a story, and he knew how to turn a phrase. I read his work out loud and let the music slide along.
Some of Henry's sonnet-thoughts on the loom of aging (in my case, the threat of turning 60):
MEZZO CAMMIN
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Half of my life is gone, and I have let
The years slip from me and have not fulfilled
The aspiration of my youth, to build
Some tower of song with lofty parapet.
Not indolence, nor pleasure, nor the fret
Of restless passions that would not be stilled,
But sorrow, and a care that almost killed,
Kept me from what I may accomplish yet;
Though, halfway up the hill, I see the Past
Lying beneath me with its sounds and sights,—
A city in the twilight dim and vast,
With smoking roofs, soft bells, and gleaming lights,—
And hear above me on the autumnal blast
The cataract of Death far thundering from the heights.
_________________________
Remember the opening to HAUNTED HOUSES?
All houses wherein men have lived and died
Are haunted houses. Through the open doors
The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,
With feet that make no sound upon the floors...
_________________________
Listen to the music!
Then again, aging ain't all bad:
DEDICATION
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Nothing that is shall perish utterly,
But perish only to revive again
In other forms, as clouds restore in rain
The exhalations of the land and sea.
Men build their houses from the masonry
Of ruined tombs; the passion and the pain
Of hearts, that long have ceased to beat, remain
To throb in hearts that are, or are to be.
So from old chronicles, where sleep in dust
Names that once filled the world with trumpet tones,
I build this verse; and flowers of song have thrust
Their roots among the loose disjointed stones,
Which to this end I fashion as I must.
Quickened are they that touch the Prophet's bones.
______________________
And of course EVANGELINE. The first sentence is the only line of poetry my mother knew, and she said it almost every time she saw a tree. In his time, Longfellow's work, in addition to making piles of money for him (rare for a poet!), was pinned up on farmhouse walls clear across the country.
from EVANGELINE
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,
Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,
Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and prophetic,
Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms.
Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced neighboring ocean
Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest.
_______________________
"And in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest..." Oh, yeah.
Saturday and Sunday is the Sacramento Art and Wine Festival on the Capitol Mall (916-552-6808), from 10-7 today and 11-6 tomorrow. (The streets around 4th and 5th and Capitol will be tied up, by the way.)
Saturday "The Show" features a multitude of lively poets tonight at Wo'se Community Center, 2863 35th St., Sac. 916-445-7378.
And hey—it's Beach Party Day at the State Fair! Cowabunga!
I think I'll go write a poem about the wail of the forest...
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Some of Henry's sonnet-thoughts on the loom of aging (in my case, the threat of turning 60):
MEZZO CAMMIN
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Half of my life is gone, and I have let
The years slip from me and have not fulfilled
The aspiration of my youth, to build
Some tower of song with lofty parapet.
Not indolence, nor pleasure, nor the fret
Of restless passions that would not be stilled,
But sorrow, and a care that almost killed,
Kept me from what I may accomplish yet;
Though, halfway up the hill, I see the Past
Lying beneath me with its sounds and sights,—
A city in the twilight dim and vast,
With smoking roofs, soft bells, and gleaming lights,—
And hear above me on the autumnal blast
The cataract of Death far thundering from the heights.
_________________________
Remember the opening to HAUNTED HOUSES?
All houses wherein men have lived and died
Are haunted houses. Through the open doors
The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,
With feet that make no sound upon the floors...
_________________________
Listen to the music!
Then again, aging ain't all bad:
DEDICATION
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Nothing that is shall perish utterly,
But perish only to revive again
In other forms, as clouds restore in rain
The exhalations of the land and sea.
Men build their houses from the masonry
Of ruined tombs; the passion and the pain
Of hearts, that long have ceased to beat, remain
To throb in hearts that are, or are to be.
So from old chronicles, where sleep in dust
Names that once filled the world with trumpet tones,
I build this verse; and flowers of song have thrust
Their roots among the loose disjointed stones,
Which to this end I fashion as I must.
Quickened are they that touch the Prophet's bones.
______________________
And of course EVANGELINE. The first sentence is the only line of poetry my mother knew, and she said it almost every time she saw a tree. In his time, Longfellow's work, in addition to making piles of money for him (rare for a poet!), was pinned up on farmhouse walls clear across the country.
from EVANGELINE
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,
Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,
Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and prophetic,
Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms.
Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced neighboring ocean
Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest.
_______________________
"And in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest..." Oh, yeah.
Saturday and Sunday is the Sacramento Art and Wine Festival on the Capitol Mall (916-552-6808), from 10-7 today and 11-6 tomorrow. (The streets around 4th and 5th and Capitol will be tied up, by the way.)
Saturday "The Show" features a multitude of lively poets tonight at Wo'se Community Center, 2863 35th St., Sac. 916-445-7378.
And hey—it's Beach Party Day at the State Fair! Cowabunga!
I think I'll go write a poem about the wail of the forest...
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Friday, August 26, 2005
Up to My Ass in Poets
I met with Jim Jobe last night at Java City; we bent our heads over his rattlechap which will be coming out two days after my 60th birthday in February. Jim has been one of the mainstays of our poetry community over the past xxxx years, and it's always a pleasure to read his work, and to hear him read it, which he does with much legerdemain. (He will be reading in Davis on both 9/9 and 9/10, by the way—more about that later.)
Pouring over poets' work with them is definitely the best thing about this job; every day I thank the cosmos that I'm able to meet as many fine poets in person as I am, living where I do. Jim was one of those who carried on the phenomenon of publishing Northern Calif. poets, noticing the value thereof; Ben Hiatt was another. I am humbly trying to stumble along in their footsteps, thanks to all of you and your faith in Medusa and her wee Snakes.
Musings from William Carlos Williams:
A CORONAL
—William Carlos Williams
New books of poetry will be written
New books and unheard of manuscripts
will come wrapped in brown paper
and many and many a time
the postman will bow
and sidle down the leaf-plastered steps
thumbing over other men's business.
But we ran ahead of it all.
One coming after
could have seen her footprints
in the wet and followed us
among the stark chestnuts.
Anemones sprang where she pressed
and cresses
stood green in the slender source—
And new books of poetry
will be written, leather-colored oakleaves
many and many a time.
______________________
And thank God for it, I say!
Todd Cirillo's broadside, Another Heart Dancing in the Flames, will be released at the special reading being held next Wednesday, August 31 at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento, 7:30pm. Here's a taste:
MUSE
—Todd Cirillo, Grass Valley
Reading the poems
of my past
to her
she says
“I had to go through a lot of pain for those.”
“I know,” I said.
Me too.
_________________________
Thanks, Todd! Todd will be reading at Luna's in November, and a rattlechap next spring.
—Medusa (who is happily up to her substantial ass in poets)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Pouring over poets' work with them is definitely the best thing about this job; every day I thank the cosmos that I'm able to meet as many fine poets in person as I am, living where I do. Jim was one of those who carried on the phenomenon of publishing Northern Calif. poets, noticing the value thereof; Ben Hiatt was another. I am humbly trying to stumble along in their footsteps, thanks to all of you and your faith in Medusa and her wee Snakes.
Musings from William Carlos Williams:
A CORONAL
—William Carlos Williams
New books of poetry will be written
New books and unheard of manuscripts
will come wrapped in brown paper
and many and many a time
the postman will bow
and sidle down the leaf-plastered steps
thumbing over other men's business.
But we ran ahead of it all.
One coming after
could have seen her footprints
in the wet and followed us
among the stark chestnuts.
Anemones sprang where she pressed
and cresses
stood green in the slender source—
And new books of poetry
will be written, leather-colored oakleaves
many and many a time.
______________________
And thank God for it, I say!
Todd Cirillo's broadside, Another Heart Dancing in the Flames, will be released at the special reading being held next Wednesday, August 31 at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento, 7:30pm. Here's a taste:
MUSE
—Todd Cirillo, Grass Valley
Reading the poems
of my past
to her
she says
“I had to go through a lot of pain for those.”
“I know,” I said.
Me too.
_________________________
Thanks, Todd! Todd will be reading at Luna's in November, and a rattlechap next spring.
—Medusa (who is happily up to her substantial ass in poets)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Beats the Hell Out of Dying...!
GRANDMA'S PROPHECY
—Ray Dunn, Red Bluff
Grandmother always told him
He would come to no good end,
But that was on the eve
Of her execution which
He attended wearing a brand
New Get-a-Life Tee shirt;
A shiny, black, silk bikini;
And a floppy, blue hat
With a bouquet of lovely
Lavender roses attached
To the brim.
Grandmother was right!
As you can easily see,
He has come to no good end,
But, on the other hand,
He has, most certainly,
Come to no bad end either;
Which he considers a paradox—
Whatever that is.
It is good for him, anyway,
That he continue—at least
It beats the hell out of dying.
___________________
Thanks, Ray! Ray Dunn has been a loyal contributor to the Snake since Issue #1.
Two deadlines loom: The Tenth Annual Focus on Writers Contest, sponsored by the Friends of the Sac. Public Library, which awards cash prizes for poetry (also short stories, articles, first chapters of novels and young-adult books). Send up to five unpublished manuscripts (along with $5 each) by August 31. Info: 916-264-2880 or www.saclibrary.org.
The other deadline is Tiger's Eye: A Journal of Poetry—August 31 for both the journal and the contest. Click on the link to your right for info.
And of course August 31 is the date of Ray Tranquilla's reading and rattlechap release (An Ocean-Front Hotel Room) at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sac., 7:30pm.
Meanwhile, Song Kowbell of Penn Valley continues to have trouble with spiders. She says they're Daddy LongLegs, that they've taken over her house, that she suspects their motives, and thank God for tree frogs and various reptiles—by which she of course means Snakes! I say, if they spin webs, they're long-legged house spiders and not DDL's, but that's a discussion for another day.
Apparently Song is not averse to tiny orange spiders, though:
SHE SPIDER
—Song Kowbell, Penn Valley
Tiny orange spider
lets go,
parachutes off
my reading lamp
spinning her web.
She ascends
to descend.
Hangs now in front
of my computer screen
watching to make sure
I speak the truth
about her abilities.
________________
Thanks, Song! More about Song, who is doing the October broadside, later.
—Medusa (who also sings the praises of reptiles)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
—Ray Dunn, Red Bluff
Grandmother always told him
He would come to no good end,
But that was on the eve
Of her execution which
He attended wearing a brand
New Get-a-Life Tee shirt;
A shiny, black, silk bikini;
And a floppy, blue hat
With a bouquet of lovely
Lavender roses attached
To the brim.
Grandmother was right!
As you can easily see,
He has come to no good end,
But, on the other hand,
He has, most certainly,
Come to no bad end either;
Which he considers a paradox—
Whatever that is.
It is good for him, anyway,
That he continue—at least
It beats the hell out of dying.
___________________
Thanks, Ray! Ray Dunn has been a loyal contributor to the Snake since Issue #1.
Two deadlines loom: The Tenth Annual Focus on Writers Contest, sponsored by the Friends of the Sac. Public Library, which awards cash prizes for poetry (also short stories, articles, first chapters of novels and young-adult books). Send up to five unpublished manuscripts (along with $5 each) by August 31. Info: 916-264-2880 or www.saclibrary.org.
The other deadline is Tiger's Eye: A Journal of Poetry—August 31 for both the journal and the contest. Click on the link to your right for info.
And of course August 31 is the date of Ray Tranquilla's reading and rattlechap release (An Ocean-Front Hotel Room) at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sac., 7:30pm.
Meanwhile, Song Kowbell of Penn Valley continues to have trouble with spiders. She says they're Daddy LongLegs, that they've taken over her house, that she suspects their motives, and thank God for tree frogs and various reptiles—by which she of course means Snakes! I say, if they spin webs, they're long-legged house spiders and not DDL's, but that's a discussion for another day.
Apparently Song is not averse to tiny orange spiders, though:
SHE SPIDER
—Song Kowbell, Penn Valley
Tiny orange spider
lets go,
parachutes off
my reading lamp
spinning her web.
She ascends
to descend.
Hangs now in front
of my computer screen
watching to make sure
I speak the truth
about her abilities.
________________
Thanks, Song! More about Song, who is doing the October broadside, later.
—Medusa (who also sings the praises of reptiles)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
The Hills Are Alive!
Next Wednesday, August 31, will be a special Rattle-read at The Book Collector to celebrate Ron Tranquilla's new chapbook, An Ocean-Front Hotel Room. Here's a sample from this highly personal collection:
APPLES
—Ron Tranquilla, Grass Valley
A boy, I climbed the neighborhood
apple tree; it lifted me to its shoulders
so I could see my school, our church,
the candy store. Leaning, holding on
tightly, I had apples easily at hand.
A boy perched in the trombones,
I thought that girl with the pony tail
in the second row of saxes was cute.
I didn’t know then that I would be winded
climbing such a little hill, the path lifting
beside little houses all the same, all fruits
gone. I didn’t know that I would fall in love
with the saxophonist, or that she
would be climbing at my side, as I
lean on her, holding on for dear life.
_______________________
Thanks, Ron! We'll be hearing a lot from the Grass Valley people this year, including broadsides from Todd Cirillo, Song Kowbell, and one (already out) from Bill Gainer. And then chaps from Ron, Bill, Todd and Song. Those hills are alive with... well, poetry, anyway.
Ron just returned from a poetry festival in Yosemite—though the highlight for him was probably the chance to visit his granddaughter. How about a D.H. Lawrence sonnet on the subject:
BABY RUNNING BAREFOOT
—D. H. Lawrence
When the white feet of the baby beat across the grass
The little white feet nod like white flowers in a wind.
They poise and run like puffs of wind that pass
Over water where the weeds are thinned.
And the sight of their white playing in the grass
Is winsome as a robin's song, so fluttering;
Or like two butterflies that settle on a glass
Cup for a moment, soft little wing-beats uttering.
And I wish that the baby would tack across here to me
Like a wind-shadow running on a pond, so she could stand
With two little bare white feet upon my knee
And I could feel her feet in either hand
Cool as syringa buds in morning hours,
Or firm and silken as young peony flowers.
______________________
Thanks, D.H.! Interesting use of repeated words—and enjambments, too.
Have a good hump day...
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
APPLES
—Ron Tranquilla, Grass Valley
A boy, I climbed the neighborhood
apple tree; it lifted me to its shoulders
so I could see my school, our church,
the candy store. Leaning, holding on
tightly, I had apples easily at hand.
A boy perched in the trombones,
I thought that girl with the pony tail
in the second row of saxes was cute.
I didn’t know then that I would be winded
climbing such a little hill, the path lifting
beside little houses all the same, all fruits
gone. I didn’t know that I would fall in love
with the saxophonist, or that she
would be climbing at my side, as I
lean on her, holding on for dear life.
_______________________
Thanks, Ron! We'll be hearing a lot from the Grass Valley people this year, including broadsides from Todd Cirillo, Song Kowbell, and one (already out) from Bill Gainer. And then chaps from Ron, Bill, Todd and Song. Those hills are alive with... well, poetry, anyway.
Ron just returned from a poetry festival in Yosemite—though the highlight for him was probably the chance to visit his granddaughter. How about a D.H. Lawrence sonnet on the subject:
BABY RUNNING BAREFOOT
—D. H. Lawrence
When the white feet of the baby beat across the grass
The little white feet nod like white flowers in a wind.
They poise and run like puffs of wind that pass
Over water where the weeds are thinned.
And the sight of their white playing in the grass
Is winsome as a robin's song, so fluttering;
Or like two butterflies that settle on a glass
Cup for a moment, soft little wing-beats uttering.
And I wish that the baby would tack across here to me
Like a wind-shadow running on a pond, so she could stand
With two little bare white feet upon my knee
And I could feel her feet in either hand
Cool as syringa buds in morning hours,
Or firm and silken as young peony flowers.
______________________
Thanks, D.H.! Interesting use of repeated words—and enjambments, too.
Have a good hump day...
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
Wine, Taxes, Poetry: Three Inevitables
June J. Engstrom of Eureka is a poet who's just joined the snake universe; welcome, June! Here's a wee sample, something to put a little whimsey into our day:
TV SEARCH
—June J. Engstrom, Eureka
Crime Scene Investigation,
Extreme Makeovers,
Just Shoot Me,
Celebrity Perks.
I scrounge through my brain
For my native intelligence
Lost in Translation.
__________________
Thanks, June!
Assistant Wrangler Robbie Grossklaus was over here last night, rescuing my fonts from oblivion. He is such a help, even as he juggles FIVE jobs! Two of which have to do with wine, one with taxes, and two with poetry (Sac. Poetry Center has just hired him as Office Manager). Wine, taxes, poetry—the man is invaluable! Robbie will be reading in Stockton September 11; more about that later.
Hidden Passage Poetry reading, this Wednesday, Aug. 24 from 6 to 7 p.m. at Hidden Passage Books, 352 Main St. in Placerville. It's an open-mike read-around, so bring your own poems or those of a favorite poet to share, or just come to listen.
Thursday, August 25, Joe Donohoe and Bucky Sinister, Harmon Leon, and special guest Rob Lozano are coming to Sacramento and bringing some friends along too. Another Poetry Unplugged exclusive! Hosted by frank andrick, Luna's (1414 16th St., Sac), 8pm.
Brad Buchanan, who teaches Literature and Creative Writing at Sac State, will be performing work from his recently-published book, The Miracle Shirker, at the Art Foundry (1021 R. Street in Sacramento) on Friday August 26 at 8:00 pm. The book is on sale at a much-reduced price of $10, and the suggested donation of $5
at the door gets you halfway there. There will also be time for questions and answers afterwards, including an open mike, if desired. [See previous Medusa posts for some samples of Brad's work.]
Another full week of poetry, if you're of a mind.
Now, for a change of mood, Kate Wells is one of the many talented Placerville poets who you might hear if you go up to Hidden Passage Books tonight. Here are two of hers:
THE SERVICE
—Kate Wells, Placerville
We wrapped her in a frayed towel
and set her in a shoebox.
Arranging paws and tail to fit.
We said a few words—what we'd remember.
I talked about her seal-like fur in every shade of brown.
The kids stared,
we cried,
setting the box in the ground.
DAY SPA
—Kate Wells, Placerville
It doesn't help to know
that the woman kneading my feet with fine oil
escaped from Armenia,
left behind the branches
and solid trunk of her family,
her dreams in a native tongue.
It doesn't help
that we're the same age
and she cradles my feet as she works
the calluses.
__________________
Thanks, Kate! Kate teaches kayaking, by the way. Look for her littlesnake broadside (#11: National Anthems) at the Book Collector, or send me an SASE (4708 Tree Shadow Pl., Fair Oaks) and I'll mail you one.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
TV SEARCH
—June J. Engstrom, Eureka
Crime Scene Investigation,
Extreme Makeovers,
Just Shoot Me,
Celebrity Perks.
I scrounge through my brain
For my native intelligence
Lost in Translation.
__________________
Thanks, June!
Assistant Wrangler Robbie Grossklaus was over here last night, rescuing my fonts from oblivion. He is such a help, even as he juggles FIVE jobs! Two of which have to do with wine, one with taxes, and two with poetry (Sac. Poetry Center has just hired him as Office Manager). Wine, taxes, poetry—the man is invaluable! Robbie will be reading in Stockton September 11; more about that later.
Hidden Passage Poetry reading, this Wednesday, Aug. 24 from 6 to 7 p.m. at Hidden Passage Books, 352 Main St. in Placerville. It's an open-mike read-around, so bring your own poems or those of a favorite poet to share, or just come to listen.
Thursday, August 25, Joe Donohoe and Bucky Sinister, Harmon Leon, and special guest Rob Lozano are coming to Sacramento and bringing some friends along too. Another Poetry Unplugged exclusive! Hosted by frank andrick, Luna's (1414 16th St., Sac), 8pm.
Brad Buchanan, who teaches Literature and Creative Writing at Sac State, will be performing work from his recently-published book, The Miracle Shirker, at the Art Foundry (1021 R. Street in Sacramento) on Friday August 26 at 8:00 pm. The book is on sale at a much-reduced price of $10, and the suggested donation of $5
at the door gets you halfway there. There will also be time for questions and answers afterwards, including an open mike, if desired. [See previous Medusa posts for some samples of Brad's work.]
Another full week of poetry, if you're of a mind.
Now, for a change of mood, Kate Wells is one of the many talented Placerville poets who you might hear if you go up to Hidden Passage Books tonight. Here are two of hers:
THE SERVICE
—Kate Wells, Placerville
We wrapped her in a frayed towel
and set her in a shoebox.
Arranging paws and tail to fit.
We said a few words—what we'd remember.
I talked about her seal-like fur in every shade of brown.
The kids stared,
we cried,
setting the box in the ground.
DAY SPA
—Kate Wells, Placerville
It doesn't help to know
that the woman kneading my feet with fine oil
escaped from Armenia,
left behind the branches
and solid trunk of her family,
her dreams in a native tongue.
It doesn't help
that we're the same age
and she cradles my feet as she works
the calluses.
__________________
Thanks, Kate! Kate teaches kayaking, by the way. Look for her littlesnake broadside (#11: National Anthems) at the Book Collector, or send me an SASE (4708 Tree Shadow Pl., Fair Oaks) and I'll mail you one.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Monday, August 22, 2005
To Glimpse One's Future
Gwen Hutchinson kindly sent a Medusa-poem; Medusa is of course enchanted with anything that has to do with her. As for glimpsing the future, well, this week I'll be pounding away at the keyboard, putting the final touches on Snake 7. Since we're in a mythical mood (perfect for Mondays), here's a sample from Norine Radaikin:
CREATION
—Norine Radaikin, Sacramento
First water, then land, then light
then a holy oak tree providing shade
then the coyote, fox, deer
then humans—man the moon, Kuksu
woman the sun, Morningstar
both created from dark red clay earth and water,
both very white in the light of the fire
made with hands to climb to escape from bear
to live in brush shelters on the eastern shore
of the Sacramento—Kuksu to hunt bear, deer, ducks
elk, geese, quail and salmon,
Morningstar to gather seeds, nuts, berries, wild plants,
and acorns to dry and make into flour,
before the emigrants, before the reservation
before the march to Round Valley.
______________________
Thanks, Norine! Makes ya want to get out there with a spear or a basket or something, doesn't it? Which is what Mondays are all about, I guess...
Here is Gwen's take on Medusa:
LIFTING THE VEIL
—Gwen Hutchinson, Sacramento
You only have to look at the Medusa straight on to see her.
And she’s not deadly. She’s beautiful and she’s laughing.
—Hélène Cixous
Snakes coil around her arms, her legs
whispering in her ear,
not of corruption, seduction,
not of destruction.
The totem serpent,
symbol of the ocean girdling the earth,
cycles of life, death, and rebirth:
the seasons.
Athene was her name in Africa,
where a serpent girdled her waist,
a sacred healing knot, and
the hair on her head—
dreadlocks.
In Greece, Zeus swallowed his first wife, Metis,
before giving birth to Athena,
Goddess of Wisdom,
from the top of his head.
Who will say this is not the birth of Medusa?
And, who will deny that Medusa’s death
gave birth to Pegasus?
To look upon the Gorgon’s face
is to glimpse one’s future,
perhaps one’s mortality before
turning into stone, symbol of the pillars
that guard the temple of
universal knowledge and wisdom.
Sovereign female wisdom: mysteries
of universal creativity and destruction
in eternal transformation.
Guardian of the thresholds,
mediator between the realms
of heaven, earth and the underworld.
Medusa is the liberating wisdom,
reflecting a culture in harmony
with nature.
She stands for all the forces
of the primordial goddess, Gaia,
the mother of all gods.
The cycles of time as: past, present and future,
the cycles of nature.
To recreate balance,
she purifies.
She is Mistress of the Beasts,
sleeping and wakeful energy,
the union of heaven and earth.
She is immortality forever shedding its skin.
The serpent at her side throughout antiquity
give immortal properties:
bleeding without wound
synchronized by cycles
of tide and moon.
Women are the dark continent,
unknowable, unexplored
with veiled, dangerous faces
longing to bring themselves into the light,
to lift the veil that hides the secrets,
the knowledge of the universe.
Perhaps Medusa laughs because she knows the truth,
and not even the loss of her head
can remove the knowledge and wisdom it contains.
______________________
Thanks, Gwen!
Don't forget SPC's Tryst With Destiny tonight at HQ (25th & R St., Sac.), 7:30pm.
And Colette Jonopulos, who knows all about the pitfalls of editing, writes that of COURSE we get typos in our poems—it's the SKWERLS!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
CREATION
—Norine Radaikin, Sacramento
First water, then land, then light
then a holy oak tree providing shade
then the coyote, fox, deer
then humans—man the moon, Kuksu
woman the sun, Morningstar
both created from dark red clay earth and water,
both very white in the light of the fire
made with hands to climb to escape from bear
to live in brush shelters on the eastern shore
of the Sacramento—Kuksu to hunt bear, deer, ducks
elk, geese, quail and salmon,
Morningstar to gather seeds, nuts, berries, wild plants,
and acorns to dry and make into flour,
before the emigrants, before the reservation
before the march to Round Valley.
______________________
Thanks, Norine! Makes ya want to get out there with a spear or a basket or something, doesn't it? Which is what Mondays are all about, I guess...
Here is Gwen's take on Medusa:
LIFTING THE VEIL
—Gwen Hutchinson, Sacramento
You only have to look at the Medusa straight on to see her.
And she’s not deadly. She’s beautiful and she’s laughing.
—Hélène Cixous
Snakes coil around her arms, her legs
whispering in her ear,
not of corruption, seduction,
not of destruction.
The totem serpent,
symbol of the ocean girdling the earth,
cycles of life, death, and rebirth:
the seasons.
Athene was her name in Africa,
where a serpent girdled her waist,
a sacred healing knot, and
the hair on her head—
dreadlocks.
In Greece, Zeus swallowed his first wife, Metis,
before giving birth to Athena,
Goddess of Wisdom,
from the top of his head.
Who will say this is not the birth of Medusa?
And, who will deny that Medusa’s death
gave birth to Pegasus?
To look upon the Gorgon’s face
is to glimpse one’s future,
perhaps one’s mortality before
turning into stone, symbol of the pillars
that guard the temple of
universal knowledge and wisdom.
Sovereign female wisdom: mysteries
of universal creativity and destruction
in eternal transformation.
Guardian of the thresholds,
mediator between the realms
of heaven, earth and the underworld.
Medusa is the liberating wisdom,
reflecting a culture in harmony
with nature.
She stands for all the forces
of the primordial goddess, Gaia,
the mother of all gods.
The cycles of time as: past, present and future,
the cycles of nature.
To recreate balance,
she purifies.
She is Mistress of the Beasts,
sleeping and wakeful energy,
the union of heaven and earth.
She is immortality forever shedding its skin.
The serpent at her side throughout antiquity
give immortal properties:
bleeding without wound
synchronized by cycles
of tide and moon.
Women are the dark continent,
unknowable, unexplored
with veiled, dangerous faces
longing to bring themselves into the light,
to lift the veil that hides the secrets,
the knowledge of the universe.
Perhaps Medusa laughs because she knows the truth,
and not even the loss of her head
can remove the knowledge and wisdom it contains.
______________________
Thanks, Gwen!
Don't forget SPC's Tryst With Destiny tonight at HQ (25th & R St., Sac.), 7:30pm.
And Colette Jonopulos, who knows all about the pitfalls of editing, writes that of COURSE we get typos in our poems—it's the SKWERLS!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Sunday, August 21, 2005
Squirrel Porn! (And baloney...)
Colette Jonopulos, co-editor of Tiger's Eye: A Journal of Poetry, writes:
Calling All Poets,
Geri Doran has stopped me in my tracks, at least long enough to read her book, Resin. I recommend her book to anyone who enjoys poetry that is deeply felt and gently written. Geri is winning awards and traveling...and making me think of what it means to be a poet.
We're inviting you (yes, you) to send us a poem (or two) about what it means to be a poet. Themes are hard to write to, but don't feel restricted. Write about the time you couldn't afford new shoelaces, because you'd used your last dollar to buy Manila envelopes to submit your poetry to a magazine you knew would never, never in your lifetime (or anyone else's) publish you.
E-mail us your serious poems, satirical poems, sensual poems, or even your super-rants; we all need a good rant now and then. Send poems to: tigerseyetracks@yahoo.com
No snail mail. No bio, just your incredible poetry. The top three poems will be posted in blog-land and you'll receive a one-year subscription to Tiger's Eye. Deadline: September 30, so you have time to haggle with your muse, no excuses.
A link to Geri Doran's book:
http://www.poets.org/npmbookdetail.php/prmMID/18904
_________________________
Thanks, Colette! She also reminds us that the next deadline for Tiger's Eye, both the contest and the journal is August 31. Click on the Tiger's Eye link to the right of this column for addresses, etc.
Which reminds me of a poem of mine which appeared in Vermont Ink, 2003:
THE AGGRESSION OF CHANGE
—Kathy Kieth
Cold fingers of an October morning
crawl down my back, waken me
with an alarm of chilly clouds
and a layer of dampness on
the baloney.
________________
Yes, that's right—baloney. It was supposed to be BALCONY, you twit! Anyone who's been published, poet or otherwise, has had typos appear in their work. I found this one (a) frustrating (2) anger-fying (3) humiliating, and (4) hilarious. But it goes with the territory. My very first published poem had the letter, "p", right in the middle of a line for no discernible reason—somebody peed in my poem. I've also been rejected by journals I never sent to, and had a poem rejected which I never wrote. (I never have, however, had a poem ACCEPTED which I never wrote...)
Anyway, I think Colette is talking about what it means to be a writer in the purest sense, but being a published writer has its quirks and sentiments, too.
Which brings us to Katy Brown's new column, "Snake Charmer's Bazaar", in Rattlesnake Review. Here's a wee excerpt from her first column, which will appear in Snake 7:
Once you have chosen to write a poem, you have made one of the hardest decisions you will ever make. Choosing to expose yourself in a poetic form is a truly risky business; taking the poem to a workshop and sending it out for submission is the next most critical and difficult step. You will most likely not become wealthy writing poetry, but the joy of seeing your work in print is tremendous.
As Marketeer-in-Residence, Katy will cheer us on, give us venues to try, clean up our publishing etiquette, and generally shove us in the right direction toward displaying our hard-won work. We can't control what happens once we send it out, but hell—what's a little baloney between friends?
Since autumn is in the air, here is my complete poem, by the way, in an effort to clear its poor little name. (Or not...)
THE AGGRESSION OF CHANGE
—Kathy Kieth, Sacramento
Cold fingers of an October morning
crawl down my back, waken me
with an alarm of chilly clouds
and a layer of dampness on
the balcony. Valley autumns bring
invading forces that set my skin
on edge, send me scuttling to shut
windows, lock the doors. Here,
winters move in quickly, aggress
upon us like the heavy footfalls
of a foreign army—icy troops
of change chasing ghosts of plastic
bags and paper cups ahead of them
down windy, empty streets lined
in amber and gold. . .
_______________________
Oh, and as for skwerl porn: check out this website: www.scarysquirrel.org/hta.html. If the prose, the graphics and the typos seem familiar to you, you're spending far too much time on That Part of the Net...
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Calling All Poets,
Geri Doran has stopped me in my tracks, at least long enough to read her book, Resin. I recommend her book to anyone who enjoys poetry that is deeply felt and gently written. Geri is winning awards and traveling...and making me think of what it means to be a poet.
We're inviting you (yes, you) to send us a poem (or two) about what it means to be a poet. Themes are hard to write to, but don't feel restricted. Write about the time you couldn't afford new shoelaces, because you'd used your last dollar to buy Manila envelopes to submit your poetry to a magazine you knew would never, never in your lifetime (or anyone else's) publish you.
E-mail us your serious poems, satirical poems, sensual poems, or even your super-rants; we all need a good rant now and then. Send poems to: tigerseyetracks@yahoo.com
No snail mail. No bio, just your incredible poetry. The top three poems will be posted in blog-land and you'll receive a one-year subscription to Tiger's Eye. Deadline: September 30, so you have time to haggle with your muse, no excuses.
A link to Geri Doran's book:
http://www.poets.org/npmbookdetail.php/prmMID/18904
_________________________
Thanks, Colette! She also reminds us that the next deadline for Tiger's Eye, both the contest and the journal is August 31. Click on the Tiger's Eye link to the right of this column for addresses, etc.
Which reminds me of a poem of mine which appeared in Vermont Ink, 2003:
THE AGGRESSION OF CHANGE
—Kathy Kieth
Cold fingers of an October morning
crawl down my back, waken me
with an alarm of chilly clouds
and a layer of dampness on
the baloney.
________________
Yes, that's right—baloney. It was supposed to be BALCONY, you twit! Anyone who's been published, poet or otherwise, has had typos appear in their work. I found this one (a) frustrating (2) anger-fying (3) humiliating, and (4) hilarious. But it goes with the territory. My very first published poem had the letter, "p", right in the middle of a line for no discernible reason—somebody peed in my poem. I've also been rejected by journals I never sent to, and had a poem rejected which I never wrote. (I never have, however, had a poem ACCEPTED which I never wrote...)
Anyway, I think Colette is talking about what it means to be a writer in the purest sense, but being a published writer has its quirks and sentiments, too.
Which brings us to Katy Brown's new column, "Snake Charmer's Bazaar", in Rattlesnake Review. Here's a wee excerpt from her first column, which will appear in Snake 7:
Once you have chosen to write a poem, you have made one of the hardest decisions you will ever make. Choosing to expose yourself in a poetic form is a truly risky business; taking the poem to a workshop and sending it out for submission is the next most critical and difficult step. You will most likely not become wealthy writing poetry, but the joy of seeing your work in print is tremendous.
As Marketeer-in-Residence, Katy will cheer us on, give us venues to try, clean up our publishing etiquette, and generally shove us in the right direction toward displaying our hard-won work. We can't control what happens once we send it out, but hell—what's a little baloney between friends?
Since autumn is in the air, here is my complete poem, by the way, in an effort to clear its poor little name. (Or not...)
THE AGGRESSION OF CHANGE
—Kathy Kieth, Sacramento
Cold fingers of an October morning
crawl down my back, waken me
with an alarm of chilly clouds
and a layer of dampness on
the balcony. Valley autumns bring
invading forces that set my skin
on edge, send me scuttling to shut
windows, lock the doors. Here,
winters move in quickly, aggress
upon us like the heavy footfalls
of a foreign army—icy troops
of change chasing ghosts of plastic
bags and paper cups ahead of them
down windy, empty streets lined
in amber and gold. . .
_______________________
Oh, and as for skwerl porn: check out this website: www.scarysquirrel.org/hta.html. If the prose, the graphics and the typos seem familiar to you, you're spending far too much time on That Part of the Net...
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Saturday, August 20, 2005
Cantos of Lotus in Her Bowl
Yesterday I received my August Strophes in the mail—the newsletter for the National Federation of State Poetry Societies, Inc. In it were listed all the winners of its annual contest, including two prizes for Sacramento's SpiralChapper Pearl Stein Selinsky: a First in the Columbine Poets of Colorado Award, and a 2HM in the League of Minnesota Poets Award. Congratulations, Pearl!
Otherwise, there was quite a dirth of California poets listed among the 500 winners in the 50 award categories. This is, of course, not due to lack of talent—could it be left-coast discrimination? More likely, Californians don't enter much. The annual contest is huge, including all sorts of diverse categories, such as sonnets, minutes and various other forms (the Gloss??), humor, lunch, cats, William Stafford, "any inanimate object", narrative, environment, heritage, power of woman, lots of "any subjects", and more. It might be fun for you to send for a pamphlet and try some of the categories, even if you don't send them in. If you're interested, check out the website: www.NFSPS.com for next year, or write to Russell H. Strauss, 18 S. Rembert St., Memphis, TN 38104. NFSPS also sponsors a national convention in various parts of the country—a couple of years ago, it was in Oregon.
Or you can support the California State Poetry Society—becoming a member of that group automatically makes you a member of NFSPS and they'll send all the stuff to you. (Don't worry—you don't have to go to any meetings, because they don't have any.) They do, however, sponsor a monthly contest, plus publishing CQ (California Quarterly), a beautiful journal of poetry which is edited on a rotating basis—our own Joyce Odam is one of those editors—and a newsletter which also accepts poetry submissions. Sacramento Poet of Note Do Gentry has a poem in the current issue of CQ, edited by Russell Salamon and Kate Ozbirn. I don't know if CSPS has a website; write to CSPS, P.O. 7126, Orange, CA 92863.
Time for a poem! Speaking of Oregon, this one is from a former Sacramentan who moved up there (via Mississippi).
WHALE SONG
—Steve Williams
I am rain barrel of black
water that ripples up staves,
through itself, until perfect
circles crawl outward in harmony
to that which is not made by man.
I am a woman who carries a singing
bowl up tilted valleys into the Himalayas
until her lungs sting through ice.
There I sound the "E" of the bowl,
join with low moans from flutes
of granite canyons.
Inside a glacial pool, near a boulder
that threatens to fall, a lotus rises,
blooms its primordial cry.
From one Pacific edge to another, sound
swirls in dark depths, turqoise shallows.
I am whale beached by wave upon wave,
cantos of lotus in her bowl, music
of mother to her son.
_____________________
Watch for more of Steve Williams' poetry in Snake 7, due out in September, or send an SASE to 4708 Tree Shadow Place, FO 95628 and I'll mail you his broadside, littlesnake broadside #1. And check out his poetry website/workshop: www.wildpoetryforum.com.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Otherwise, there was quite a dirth of California poets listed among the 500 winners in the 50 award categories. This is, of course, not due to lack of talent—could it be left-coast discrimination? More likely, Californians don't enter much. The annual contest is huge, including all sorts of diverse categories, such as sonnets, minutes and various other forms (the Gloss??), humor, lunch, cats, William Stafford, "any inanimate object", narrative, environment, heritage, power of woman, lots of "any subjects", and more. It might be fun for you to send for a pamphlet and try some of the categories, even if you don't send them in. If you're interested, check out the website: www.NFSPS.com for next year, or write to Russell H. Strauss, 18 S. Rembert St., Memphis, TN 38104. NFSPS also sponsors a national convention in various parts of the country—a couple of years ago, it was in Oregon.
Or you can support the California State Poetry Society—becoming a member of that group automatically makes you a member of NFSPS and they'll send all the stuff to you. (Don't worry—you don't have to go to any meetings, because they don't have any.) They do, however, sponsor a monthly contest, plus publishing CQ (California Quarterly), a beautiful journal of poetry which is edited on a rotating basis—our own Joyce Odam is one of those editors—and a newsletter which also accepts poetry submissions. Sacramento Poet of Note Do Gentry has a poem in the current issue of CQ, edited by Russell Salamon and Kate Ozbirn. I don't know if CSPS has a website; write to CSPS, P.O. 7126, Orange, CA 92863.
Time for a poem! Speaking of Oregon, this one is from a former Sacramentan who moved up there (via Mississippi).
WHALE SONG
—Steve Williams
I am rain barrel of black
water that ripples up staves,
through itself, until perfect
circles crawl outward in harmony
to that which is not made by man.
I am a woman who carries a singing
bowl up tilted valleys into the Himalayas
until her lungs sting through ice.
There I sound the "E" of the bowl,
join with low moans from flutes
of granite canyons.
Inside a glacial pool, near a boulder
that threatens to fall, a lotus rises,
blooms its primordial cry.
From one Pacific edge to another, sound
swirls in dark depths, turqoise shallows.
I am whale beached by wave upon wave,
cantos of lotus in her bowl, music
of mother to her son.
_____________________
Watch for more of Steve Williams' poetry in Snake 7, due out in September, or send an SASE to 4708 Tree Shadow Place, FO 95628 and I'll mail you his broadside, littlesnake broadside #1. And check out his poetry website/workshop: www.wildpoetryforum.com.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Friday, August 19, 2005
Special Rattle-Read!
Rattlesnake Press is proud to announce the release of An Ocean-Front Hotel Room by Ron Tranquilla of Grass Valley, which will be celebrated with a SPECIAL RATTLE-READ at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sac., on AUGUST 31 at 7:30pm. (Could I possibly get more red into one paragraph?) Please come join us for this very special Snake event. (In case the name, "Tranquilla," rings a bell with you, it may be because Ron's son, Ryan, was previously Director of California Poets and Writers.) More about Ron's book to come.
This Monday, Rhony Bhopla will host Tryst With Destiny 2: Poets Celebrate the Beauty of India, which will be held at HQ, 25th & R Streets, Sac., 7:30pm. The event is sponsored by Sacramento Poetry Center. Rhony says:
Tryst with Destiny 2 will highlight the performances of several young dancers, and also a reading by Rhony Bhopla. There will be some selections from Poets of the Past, and gift give-aways. "Tryst with Destiny" was the speech given by the first Prime Minister of India (Nehru) at the liberation of India in 1947.
Here's a poem by Rhony:
BINDIS AND BANGLES
—Rhony Bhopla, Sacramento
India seeps through kajal
lined lotus petal eyes
I feel her henna oiled hands bend me
towards men that disguise
my earlobes, swinging gold loops
resonant of flutes and tabla pounding
Indian Ocean tides wishing away
dirty crowds, and the tsunami ravaged south
she undulates under the sting of mosquito nights
sequined in saris by master tailors unnoticed
rotis and dalls pour like the Ganges
for the last Untouchable quivering at the temple
bindis and kum kum silt on foreheads
of matriarchs, unrelenting in desire and power
silver toe rings shine like the glistening collapsing air
between a new bride and her husband
her struggle begins in the bazaar
with bindis and bangles.
kajal = eyeliner
tabla = drums
sari = 6 yard wrap
roti = flat bread
dalls = lentils
bindis = decorative dots or designs centered in forehead
kum kum = red powder used in hair part or forehead
_______________________________
Thanks, Rhony, for your evocative and exotic poem. (Mosquitos, even!) Those of you who attended last year's Tryst remember how elegant and beautiful it was.
And don't forget the reading at La Raza tonight by Joe Finkleman and Susan Hennies. The two of them have written many interesting poems for two voices. 7:30pm.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
This Monday, Rhony Bhopla will host Tryst With Destiny 2: Poets Celebrate the Beauty of India, which will be held at HQ, 25th & R Streets, Sac., 7:30pm. The event is sponsored by Sacramento Poetry Center. Rhony says:
Tryst with Destiny 2 will highlight the performances of several young dancers, and also a reading by Rhony Bhopla. There will be some selections from Poets of the Past, and gift give-aways. "Tryst with Destiny" was the speech given by the first Prime Minister of India (Nehru) at the liberation of India in 1947.
Here's a poem by Rhony:
BINDIS AND BANGLES
—Rhony Bhopla, Sacramento
India seeps through kajal
lined lotus petal eyes
I feel her henna oiled hands bend me
towards men that disguise
my earlobes, swinging gold loops
resonant of flutes and tabla pounding
Indian Ocean tides wishing away
dirty crowds, and the tsunami ravaged south
she undulates under the sting of mosquito nights
sequined in saris by master tailors unnoticed
rotis and dalls pour like the Ganges
for the last Untouchable quivering at the temple
bindis and kum kum silt on foreheads
of matriarchs, unrelenting in desire and power
silver toe rings shine like the glistening collapsing air
between a new bride and her husband
her struggle begins in the bazaar
with bindis and bangles.
kajal = eyeliner
tabla = drums
sari = 6 yard wrap
roti = flat bread
dalls = lentils
bindis = decorative dots or designs centered in forehead
kum kum = red powder used in hair part or forehead
_______________________________
Thanks, Rhony, for your evocative and exotic poem. (Mosquitos, even!) Those of you who attended last year's Tryst remember how elegant and beautiful it was.
And don't forget the reading at La Raza tonight by Joe Finkleman and Susan Hennies. The two of them have written many interesting poems for two voices. 7:30pm.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Thursday, August 18, 2005
Skreaking Under the Eaves
This Saturday, August 20, will be Arts Day at the State Fair, beginning with poetry festivities at 11 a.m. on the PG&E Center Stage. Cal. Poet Laureate Al Young will appear at 11:30; Sac. PL Julia Connor at 12, and Cal. High School Poet Laureate Lindsey Smith (from Annapolis in Sonoma County) at 12:15, followed by the Sac. Metro. Arts Commission's World Arts and Poetry Slam at 12:45. From then on, the day will proceed with several dance troops, including Tongan and Polynesian. For further info, check the State Fair website (just Google up "Cal. State Fair").
And also check The Sacramento Bee "Scene" section today for an interview of the above-mentioned Lindsey Smith. I didn't even know we HAD a High School Poet Laureate!
After you spend Saturday morning listening to all these Laureates, head up the hill that evening to the Grass Valley Center for the Arts, 314 W. Main St. in Grass Valley for some Cowboy Poetry featuring Mick Vernon, Janice Gilbertson and Harold Roy Miller, 7:30 p.m. $5 ($1 for those under 18). Refreshments, open mic.
Here are a couple of poems from Patricia Wellingham-Jones of Tehama. Not coincidentally, one of them is about bats...
JENNY MADE ME PROMISE
—Patricia Wellingham-Jones
that I wouldn’t say a word
when that day in mid August arrived
She gets teary-eyed
at the thought of summer’s end
So today I don’t email her
nudge smile or wink
as I feel the planet shift
beneath my feet
Jenny won’t let herself notice
yet the smell of the land changes
A cool breeze lifts the hair
on my arms leaf edges crisp
days are hot evenings mellow
children race their last before school
and my nose twitches to catch the first
faint whiff of autumn bonfires
UNDER THE EAVES
—Patricia Wellingham-Jones
a window screen rattles
gray air stirs
with a soft black brush
Wings beat
frantic
voice skreaks in waves
Migrating bat
tries to find
her new home
___________________
Thanks, Patricia! My apologies, though, to both her and Taylor Graham (see yesterday) for my failure to indent—HTML has me bumfuzzled. (In Patricia's bat poem, envision the middle line of each stanza moved slightly in...)
—Medusa (skreak skreak skreak—I love that word! Skritching and skreaking...)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
And also check The Sacramento Bee "Scene" section today for an interview of the above-mentioned Lindsey Smith. I didn't even know we HAD a High School Poet Laureate!
After you spend Saturday morning listening to all these Laureates, head up the hill that evening to the Grass Valley Center for the Arts, 314 W. Main St. in Grass Valley for some Cowboy Poetry featuring Mick Vernon, Janice Gilbertson and Harold Roy Miller, 7:30 p.m. $5 ($1 for those under 18). Refreshments, open mic.
Here are a couple of poems from Patricia Wellingham-Jones of Tehama. Not coincidentally, one of them is about bats...
JENNY MADE ME PROMISE
—Patricia Wellingham-Jones
that I wouldn’t say a word
when that day in mid August arrived
She gets teary-eyed
at the thought of summer’s end
So today I don’t email her
nudge smile or wink
as I feel the planet shift
beneath my feet
Jenny won’t let herself notice
yet the smell of the land changes
A cool breeze lifts the hair
on my arms leaf edges crisp
days are hot evenings mellow
children race their last before school
and my nose twitches to catch the first
faint whiff of autumn bonfires
UNDER THE EAVES
—Patricia Wellingham-Jones
a window screen rattles
gray air stirs
with a soft black brush
Wings beat
frantic
voice skreaks in waves
Migrating bat
tries to find
her new home
___________________
Thanks, Patricia! My apologies, though, to both her and Taylor Graham (see yesterday) for my failure to indent—HTML has me bumfuzzled. (In Patricia's bat poem, envision the middle line of each stanza moved slightly in...)
—Medusa (skreak skreak skreak—I love that word! Skritching and skreaking...)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Wee Nips from West Nile
WEST NILE
—Taylor Graham, Somerset
They’re spraying
for the public health.
They tell us to stay indoors,
bring in our pets. But
not to worry. It only kills
the bugs that bear disease
from a place so far away,
on mosquitos. At dusk,
in a single night.
__________________
Okay, I confess. I have an agenda, here, about this current messing with the ecosystem. At least I'm not alone— Thanks, TG! Her muse was well-stirred.
The birth of Snake 7 continues; hard labor and the usual scurry to get hot water and plenty of towels. Ouch ouch! Everybody breathe... BL Kennedy outdid himself this time with his own 418 BL Buzz and scads of mini-reviews, plus commandeering the lovely and talented Charlene Ungstad to write a couple more. (Henceforth, Snake 7 will be known as "The Review Issue".) But that's a good thing, not only because BL is such a hard worker and supporter of the Snake, but because I happen to think reviews are very important in an industry where it's so hard to get out the word about books in print—especially all those wee gems that slip under the radar of the traditional press.
BL, by the way, is hosting his Urban Voices series tonight at South Natomas Library on Truxel Road, 7-8pm: Barbara Noble and Suzanne Roberts, a poet from Tahoe.
Have a good day: be safe and write lots (and send me your poems!).
—Medusa (ouch ouch! more hot water!)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
—Taylor Graham, Somerset
They’re spraying
for the public health.
They tell us to stay indoors,
bring in our pets. But
not to worry. It only kills
the bugs that bear disease
from a place so far away,
only wings
could reach. Mosquitos.Swallows that sweep
above an August pond, feedingon mosquitos. At dusk,
the bats that zap
mosquitos by the thousandsin a single night.
This evening
we spray death.__________________
Okay, I confess. I have an agenda, here, about this current messing with the ecosystem. At least I'm not alone— Thanks, TG! Her muse was well-stirred.
The birth of Snake 7 continues; hard labor and the usual scurry to get hot water and plenty of towels. Ouch ouch! Everybody breathe... BL Kennedy outdid himself this time with his own 418 BL Buzz and scads of mini-reviews, plus commandeering the lovely and talented Charlene Ungstad to write a couple more. (Henceforth, Snake 7 will be known as "The Review Issue".) But that's a good thing, not only because BL is such a hard worker and supporter of the Snake, but because I happen to think reviews are very important in an industry where it's so hard to get out the word about books in print—especially all those wee gems that slip under the radar of the traditional press.
BL, by the way, is hosting his Urban Voices series tonight at South Natomas Library on Truxel Road, 7-8pm: Barbara Noble and Suzanne Roberts, a poet from Tahoe.
Have a good day: be safe and write lots (and send me your poems!).
—Medusa (ouch ouch! more hot water!)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Indigo on Thursday
Indigo Moor will be featured at Luna's (1414 16th St., Sac, 8pm) this Thursday. Here's a sample:
NOMADS
—Indigo Moor
For six days we purify metal,
Vulcan's children, sleepwalking
through sulfur clouds. A few pennies
forged for every muscled clang
of pig iron and rust. Friday’s whistle,
our Pavlovian call to bedlam,
triggers us down to dogs.
Loose drunk all Saturday, we hang
our checks on new shoes, silk ties,
and gold chains. Scrub iron ore
from our fingers, coke dust from faces
before slow fading from day to night.
A bottle of gin passes between us
as we stiff leg and hip drop a pimp
down the boulevard. We tug our hats
down until our faces are curved horizons
with brown, felt suns rising askew.
Somewhere in this city
there is music worth killing for:
manna soaked in bourbon
grilled over hot Mississippi coals.
The Easy Lion Jazz Joint
leans toward us and winks.
The intoxicating vibration
of wood-stomp and tremor-slide.
A quartet of horns, a string bass,
and skins jerks us into dance—
freezes us into stained glass hunger.
This is our siren song:
Bass so cold it shatters hot breath.
The sax man's vibrato wrenches
fevered moans from our bodies.
Sways us into cattails wrapped
in silk and sweat. Given the chance,
spit-shined leather begins to fly.
Two more juke joints before sunrise.
A plate of ribs and a whiskey sour.
Sunday morning is a hangover
hard as an I-beam laid into our heads.
All too soon, the factory whistle.
___________________________
Thanks, Indigo! Indigo has returned to us from many poetry adventures/readings/awards in New England and elsewhere.
In other adventures: Former Sacramentan Be Davison Herrera writes: Jack and I did a COMET&STAR (poetry and flute, clarinet) at a Voices of War event feature at Oregon State University and hosted a performance event for the [Sacramento poets] StraightOut Scribes ( Staajabu and V.S. Chochezi) as one stop on their 2005 USA Tour at the local Borders Books in Corvallis, with 45 attendees. We were part of the "4th Sunday at 4" music series at the Episcopal Church of the Good Samaritan here in Corvallis. We did a quickie at the River Gallery "Women Go Wild" events in Independence, Oregon, and I came in fifth at the DaVinci Days Festival poetry slam reading—an homage to Johnny Cash!
Good to see that Be is staying active after her move to Corvallis!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
NOMADS
—Indigo Moor
For six days we purify metal,
Vulcan's children, sleepwalking
through sulfur clouds. A few pennies
forged for every muscled clang
of pig iron and rust. Friday’s whistle,
our Pavlovian call to bedlam,
triggers us down to dogs.
Loose drunk all Saturday, we hang
our checks on new shoes, silk ties,
and gold chains. Scrub iron ore
from our fingers, coke dust from faces
before slow fading from day to night.
A bottle of gin passes between us
as we stiff leg and hip drop a pimp
down the boulevard. We tug our hats
down until our faces are curved horizons
with brown, felt suns rising askew.
Somewhere in this city
there is music worth killing for:
manna soaked in bourbon
grilled over hot Mississippi coals.
The Easy Lion Jazz Joint
leans toward us and winks.
The intoxicating vibration
of wood-stomp and tremor-slide.
A quartet of horns, a string bass,
and skins jerks us into dance—
freezes us into stained glass hunger.
This is our siren song:
Bass so cold it shatters hot breath.
The sax man's vibrato wrenches
fevered moans from our bodies.
Sways us into cattails wrapped
in silk and sweat. Given the chance,
spit-shined leather begins to fly.
Two more juke joints before sunrise.
A plate of ribs and a whiskey sour.
Sunday morning is a hangover
hard as an I-beam laid into our heads.
All too soon, the factory whistle.
___________________________
Thanks, Indigo! Indigo has returned to us from many poetry adventures/readings/awards in New England and elsewhere.
In other adventures: Former Sacramentan Be Davison Herrera writes: Jack and I did a COMET&STAR (poetry and flute, clarinet) at a Voices of War event feature at Oregon State University and hosted a performance event for the [Sacramento poets] StraightOut Scribes ( Staajabu and V.S. Chochezi) as one stop on their 2005 USA Tour at the local Borders Books in Corvallis, with 45 attendees. We were part of the "4th Sunday at 4" music series at the Episcopal Church of the Good Samaritan here in Corvallis. We did a quickie at the River Gallery "Women Go Wild" events in Independence, Oregon, and I came in fifth at the DaVinci Days Festival poetry slam reading—an homage to Johnny Cash!
Good to see that Be is staying active after her move to Corvallis!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Monday, August 15, 2005
Bats and Bees and the Typing of Snakes
CLAUSTROPHOBIA IN CHECHEM-HA
—Lynn M. Hansen, Modesto
My fear is of no concern to the Fer-de-Lance
the bat, the arachnid, Mayan pottery or the dead.
This cave is home, hidden by green vines
bathed in filtered rainforest light.
Thin tongues flick out in the darkness
sensing warm prey. Winged mice navigate,
use echoes from high pitched screams to hunt.
Long tactile legs of whip scorpions extend
over rocky walls, searching for insects.
Silent pottery sits on shallow ledges,
above ancestral bones lying near
altar for Mayan sacred ceremonies.
I stand frozen in the darkness,
paralyzed by fear of small spaces.
Tiny drops of water carry cargo of minerals,
form stalactites, stalagmites, narrow corridors
that do not block the flow of cool moist air;
snakes, bats, arthropods, spelunkers
enjoy this underground labyrinth.
I cannot breathe;
someone is standing on my chest.
____________________
Somehow, Lynn knew I was looking for a bat poem to further my grieving of the impact the current mosquito removal will have on the environment. Thanks, Lynn!
And Joyce Odam has been archiving Medusa, printing out each and every posting and putting it into a fancy white binder. O Joyce, thank you—for that and for passing on this wonderful Amy Lowell poem:
CARREFOUR
—Amy Lowell
O you,
Who came upon me once
Stretched under apple-trees just after bathing,
Why did you not strangle me before speaking
Rather than fill me with the wild white honey of your words
And then leave me to the mercy
Of the forest bees.
____________________
Don't forget Brad Buchanan's reading tonight at HQ (25th & R, Sac.), 7:30pm.
And today begins the type-a-thon that is Snake 7; if you haven't sent anything in yet, do it NOW!
—Medusa (who awaits the wild white honey of your words...)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
—Lynn M. Hansen, Modesto
My fear is of no concern to the Fer-de-Lance
the bat, the arachnid, Mayan pottery or the dead.
This cave is home, hidden by green vines
bathed in filtered rainforest light.
Thin tongues flick out in the darkness
sensing warm prey. Winged mice navigate,
use echoes from high pitched screams to hunt.
Long tactile legs of whip scorpions extend
over rocky walls, searching for insects.
Silent pottery sits on shallow ledges,
above ancestral bones lying near
altar for Mayan sacred ceremonies.
I stand frozen in the darkness,
paralyzed by fear of small spaces.
Tiny drops of water carry cargo of minerals,
form stalactites, stalagmites, narrow corridors
that do not block the flow of cool moist air;
snakes, bats, arthropods, spelunkers
enjoy this underground labyrinth.
I cannot breathe;
someone is standing on my chest.
____________________
Somehow, Lynn knew I was looking for a bat poem to further my grieving of the impact the current mosquito removal will have on the environment. Thanks, Lynn!
And Joyce Odam has been archiving Medusa, printing out each and every posting and putting it into a fancy white binder. O Joyce, thank you—for that and for passing on this wonderful Amy Lowell poem:
CARREFOUR
—Amy Lowell
O you,
Who came upon me once
Stretched under apple-trees just after bathing,
Why did you not strangle me before speaking
Rather than fill me with the wild white honey of your words
And then leave me to the mercy
Of the forest bees.
____________________
Don't forget Brad Buchanan's reading tonight at HQ (25th & R, Sac.), 7:30pm.
And today begins the type-a-thon that is Snake 7; if you haven't sent anything in yet, do it NOW!
—Medusa (who awaits the wild white honey of your words...)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Sunday, August 14, 2005
Just Poetry, Five: D.H. Lawrence
ON THE BALCONY
—D.H. Lawrence
In front of the sombre mountains, a faint, lost ribbon of rainbow,
And between us and it, the thunder;
And down below in the green wheat, the labourers
Stand like dark stumps, still in the green wheat.
You are near to me, and your naked feet in their sandals,
And through the scent of the balcony's naked timber
I distinguish the scent of your hair: so now the limber
Lightning falls from heaven.
Adown the pale green river glacier floats
A dark boat through the gloom—and whither?
The thunder roars. But still we have each other!
The naked lightnings in the heavens dither
And disappear—what have we but each other?
The boat has gone.
______________________
AWARE
—D.H. Lawrence
Slowly the moon is rising out of the muddy haze,
Divesting herself of her golden shift, and so
Emerging white and exquisite; and I in amaze
See in the sky before me, a woman I did not know
I loved, but there she goes, and her beauty hurts my heart;
I follow her down the night, begging her not to depart.
______________________
MOONRISE
—D.H. Lawrence
And who has seen the moon, who has not seen
Her rise from out of the chamber of the deep,
Flushed and grand and naked, as from the chamber
Of finished bridegroom, seen her rise and throw
Confession of delight upon the wave,
Littering the waves with her own superscription
Of blliss, till all her lambent beauty shakes towards us
Spread out and known at last, and we are sure
That beauty is a thing beyond the grave,
That perfect, bright experience never falls
To nothingness, and time will dim the moon
Sooner than our full consummation here
In this odd life will tarnish or pass away.
__________________
Thanks, D.H. (What IS your first name, anyway?) Personally, of course, Medusa loves his Snake best...
Tomorrow is the deadline for submissions to Rattlesnake Review #7—see yesterday's post for details. Carpe Viperidae—Seize the Snake!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
—D.H. Lawrence
In front of the sombre mountains, a faint, lost ribbon of rainbow,
And between us and it, the thunder;
And down below in the green wheat, the labourers
Stand like dark stumps, still in the green wheat.
You are near to me, and your naked feet in their sandals,
And through the scent of the balcony's naked timber
I distinguish the scent of your hair: so now the limber
Lightning falls from heaven.
Adown the pale green river glacier floats
A dark boat through the gloom—and whither?
The thunder roars. But still we have each other!
The naked lightnings in the heavens dither
And disappear—what have we but each other?
The boat has gone.
______________________
AWARE
—D.H. Lawrence
Slowly the moon is rising out of the muddy haze,
Divesting herself of her golden shift, and so
Emerging white and exquisite; and I in amaze
See in the sky before me, a woman I did not know
I loved, but there she goes, and her beauty hurts my heart;
I follow her down the night, begging her not to depart.
______________________
MOONRISE
—D.H. Lawrence
And who has seen the moon, who has not seen
Her rise from out of the chamber of the deep,
Flushed and grand and naked, as from the chamber
Of finished bridegroom, seen her rise and throw
Confession of delight upon the wave,
Littering the waves with her own superscription
Of blliss, till all her lambent beauty shakes towards us
Spread out and known at last, and we are sure
That beauty is a thing beyond the grave,
That perfect, bright experience never falls
To nothingness, and time will dim the moon
Sooner than our full consummation here
In this odd life will tarnish or pass away.
__________________
Thanks, D.H. (What IS your first name, anyway?) Personally, of course, Medusa loves his Snake best...
Tomorrow is the deadline for submissions to Rattlesnake Review #7—see yesterday's post for details. Carpe Viperidae—Seize the Snake!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Saturday, August 13, 2005
Are we hot, or what?
THE PRIEST OF FLOWERS
—Susan Kelly-DeWitt
Let him fly like a dark bird across the waters
bringing oil and wafers. Let him swoop down
over the endless fields of Being,
searching for the souls of lost flowers.
Let him arrive swinging his censer
to perfume the last rites.
____________________
Thanks, Susan!
Readings in town every day this coming week—are we hot, or what? And who says our poetry scene slows down for summer?!
•Monday: Brad Buchanan will read at HQ (25th and R, Sac.) for Sac. Poetry Center, 7:30pm. See previous postings for samples of his poetry.
•Tuesday: Third Tuesday Poetry Series will present Jean Vengua (writer/researcher/teacher at UC Berkeley in Filipino-American studies) and Fausto Avendano (CSUS professor of Hispanic Literature) at La Raza/Galeria Posada, 1421 R St., Sac., 7:30pm.
•Wednesday: Urban Voices at South Natomas library, 2901 Truxel Rd., Sac.: Barbara Noble from Sacramento and Suzanne Roberts from Tahoe, 7pm.
•Thursday: Indigo Moor at Poetry Unplugged, Luna's, 1414 16th, Sac., 8pm.
•Friday: Escritores del Nuevo Sol presents Susan Hennies and Joe Finkleman with musical accompaniment by Francesca Reitano on Native American flute and Mark Halverson on percussion. La Raza/Galeria Posada, 15th & R, Sac., 7:30pm. $5.
•Saturday: Nevada County Poetry Series: Cowboy Poetry, 7:30pm. Center for the Arts, 314 W. Main St., Grass Valley. Info: 432-8196. $5.
•And watch for more info about California Poet Laureate Al Young being at the California State Fair on Saturday, August 20.
More about some of these as the week progresses. And don't forget the Poems-for-All reading tonight at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sac., 7:30: Frank Andrick, Michelle Tea, Rachel Savage and Rachel Leibrock.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
—Susan Kelly-DeWitt
Let him fly like a dark bird across the waters
bringing oil and wafers. Let him swoop down
over the endless fields of Being,
searching for the souls of lost flowers.
Let him arrive swinging his censer
to perfume the last rites.
____________________
Thanks, Susan!
Readings in town every day this coming week—are we hot, or what? And who says our poetry scene slows down for summer?!
•Monday: Brad Buchanan will read at HQ (25th and R, Sac.) for Sac. Poetry Center, 7:30pm. See previous postings for samples of his poetry.
•Tuesday: Third Tuesday Poetry Series will present Jean Vengua (writer/researcher/teacher at UC Berkeley in Filipino-American studies) and Fausto Avendano (CSUS professor of Hispanic Literature) at La Raza/Galeria Posada, 1421 R St., Sac., 7:30pm.
•Wednesday: Urban Voices at South Natomas library, 2901 Truxel Rd., Sac.: Barbara Noble from Sacramento and Suzanne Roberts from Tahoe, 7pm.
•Thursday: Indigo Moor at Poetry Unplugged, Luna's, 1414 16th, Sac., 8pm.
•Friday: Escritores del Nuevo Sol presents Susan Hennies and Joe Finkleman with musical accompaniment by Francesca Reitano on Native American flute and Mark Halverson on percussion. La Raza/Galeria Posada, 15th & R, Sac., 7:30pm. $5.
•Saturday: Nevada County Poetry Series: Cowboy Poetry, 7:30pm. Center for the Arts, 314 W. Main St., Grass Valley. Info: 432-8196. $5.
•And watch for more info about California Poet Laureate Al Young being at the California State Fair on Saturday, August 20.
More about some of these as the week progresses. And don't forget the Poems-for-All reading tonight at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sac., 7:30: Frank Andrick, Michelle Tea, Rachel Savage and Rachel Leibrock.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Friday, August 12, 2005
Doubling the Staff!
Monday (8/15) is the next deadline for Rattlesnake Review. Send 3-5 poems by snail (4708 Tree Shadow Place, Fair Oaks, 95628) or e-mail (kathykieth@hotmail.com). No cover letters/bios, no simul-subs, no previously-pubs. The Snake also publishes artwork and photographs, too; send 'em along!
I've been thinking a lot about the Review this summer, and a lot of new features have been born. Far be it from that lazy Medusa to do any work, though—so I've hired four more columnists to contribute regular articles in specific areas. To wit:
• Marketeer-in-Residence KATY BROWN: We don't know if there even IS such a word, but it seemed like a good one to label Katy as she writes her new column, "Snake-Charmer's Bazaar: Poems in the Marketplace". Katy will continue to explore all the ins and outs of publishing: venues, etiquette, how-to's... Who knows? The possibilities are endless.
• Formalist-in-Residence JOYCE ODAM: The irrepressible Joyce O will pass on some of her vast knowledge of forms and how to use them in your own work in her new column, "About Form—Form Vs. Formal". Joyce has a special knack for making these tools seem accessible and useful and even fun.
• Interviewer-in-Residence JOANN ANGLIN: I consider interviews to be a hugely important part of poetry journalism, capturing the essence of people on paper for future generations and giving us a glimpse into who they are and how they work. JoAnn is a skillful, experienced interviewer who will join us, starting with the December issue.
• Something-or-Other-in-Residence Who Helps Us Find New Poems By Suggesting Possible Triggering Devices TAYLOR GRAHAM: We haven't come up with a name yet for this position, but Taylor is a skillful teacher who works with her Pony Espresso Poets/Tuesday at Two people in Pollock Pines on a weekly basis, giving them poetry "triggers" to get them started. Together, this group will be passing on these triggers and examples to help us get rolling on those grey days when the muse eludes us...
Also new in Snake 7 will be littlesnake's Poetry Puzzles for Big and Little Kids (a kid's page) and Medusa's Meanderings: Gossip from the Gorgon, which will list readings and other events—plus whatever else Medusa comes up with (or you send her) in her dementia, a la Medusa's Kitchen.
All these wonderful people will join our staff, which includes Robbie Grossklaus (Asst. Wranger), Sam Kieth (Artist-in-Residence), and B.L. Kennedy (Reviewer-in-Residence)—all of whom are such wonderful help to me and continue to be my mainstays.
And there may be even more new features! Keep tuning in to see whatever other nonsense evolves on this speeding train of ours...
Let's close with a little D.H. Lawrence:
GREEN
—D.H. Lawrence
The dawn was apple-green,
The sky was green wine held up in the sun,
The moon was a golden petal between.
She opened her eyes, and green
They shone, clear like flowers undone
For the first time, now for the first time seen.
__________________
—Medusa
I've been thinking a lot about the Review this summer, and a lot of new features have been born. Far be it from that lazy Medusa to do any work, though—so I've hired four more columnists to contribute regular articles in specific areas. To wit:
• Marketeer-in-Residence KATY BROWN: We don't know if there even IS such a word, but it seemed like a good one to label Katy as she writes her new column, "Snake-Charmer's Bazaar: Poems in the Marketplace". Katy will continue to explore all the ins and outs of publishing: venues, etiquette, how-to's... Who knows? The possibilities are endless.
• Formalist-in-Residence JOYCE ODAM: The irrepressible Joyce O will pass on some of her vast knowledge of forms and how to use them in your own work in her new column, "About Form—Form Vs. Formal". Joyce has a special knack for making these tools seem accessible and useful and even fun.
• Interviewer-in-Residence JOANN ANGLIN: I consider interviews to be a hugely important part of poetry journalism, capturing the essence of people on paper for future generations and giving us a glimpse into who they are and how they work. JoAnn is a skillful, experienced interviewer who will join us, starting with the December issue.
• Something-or-Other-in-Residence Who Helps Us Find New Poems By Suggesting Possible Triggering Devices TAYLOR GRAHAM: We haven't come up with a name yet for this position, but Taylor is a skillful teacher who works with her Pony Espresso Poets/Tuesday at Two people in Pollock Pines on a weekly basis, giving them poetry "triggers" to get them started. Together, this group will be passing on these triggers and examples to help us get rolling on those grey days when the muse eludes us...
Also new in Snake 7 will be littlesnake's Poetry Puzzles for Big and Little Kids (a kid's page) and Medusa's Meanderings: Gossip from the Gorgon, which will list readings and other events—plus whatever else Medusa comes up with (or you send her) in her dementia, a la Medusa's Kitchen.
All these wonderful people will join our staff, which includes Robbie Grossklaus (Asst. Wranger), Sam Kieth (Artist-in-Residence), and B.L. Kennedy (Reviewer-in-Residence)—all of whom are such wonderful help to me and continue to be my mainstays.
And there may be even more new features! Keep tuning in to see whatever other nonsense evolves on this speeding train of ours...
Let's close with a little D.H. Lawrence:
GREEN
—D.H. Lawrence
The dawn was apple-green,
The sky was green wine held up in the sun,
The moon was a golden petal between.
She opened her eyes, and green
They shone, clear like flowers undone
For the first time, now for the first time seen.
__________________
—Medusa
Thursday, August 11, 2005
Put on your listening shoes...
Lots of readings this weekend:
*Poetry Unplugged tonight at Luna's, 1414 16th, Sac, 8-ish
*PWJ Publishing presents the Skyway Poets, featuring Joy Harold Helsing and her new book, Confessions of the Hare and other old tales, in a reading on Saturday at 7 p.m. at Art, Etc., 122 W. Third Street, Chico, California. 530-895-1161. Other poets include Patricia Wellingham-Jones, Audrey C. Small, Sally Allen McNall, Lara Gularte, Ann Doro and Kathleen McPartland.
*Poems-for-All Saturday night at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sac, 7:30: Frank Andrick, Michelle Tea, Rachel Savage and Rachel Leibrock.
*Sunday's Pomo Literati (two-hour quarterly radio program) hosted by Frank Andrick: KUSF 90.3, SF (www.kusf.org); 2-4 pm. A plethora of poets, live or on tape. It's Frank Andrick's birthday bash!
*Sac Poetry Center presents Brad Buchanan (see my earlier posting) at HQ (25th and R, Sac), 7:30 pm. on Monday. Here is another wee sample from Brad:
QUIET ALERT
—Brad Buchanan
Not sad, but crying,
the baby is signaling
her newfound needs—
the world’s in a holding
pattern, and knows it.
We work the angles
of blankets and breastfeeding,
tilt at the windmills
of burping, navigate
the pink circumference
under a diaper,
discover the truth behind
rumors of new uprisings
from the south,
decode the morsels
that drop from her mouth,
and then relax all the way
back to delight
seeing her eyes open,
quiet, alert.
___________________
Thanks, Brad!
Meanwhile, I continue to perserverate on the genocide of mosquitos. Herewith is an ode of my own:
MOSQUITOS OVER THE WATER
—Kathy Kieth, Fair Oaks
hover in the twilight: land
on the meniscus of the dark
pond, then lift off again—lift
without getting caught, without
being pulled under by watery
claws that tug at small feet: under-
tow that drags them, tries to suck
tiny pontoons down into its teary
darkness, its black, watery arms. . .
Mosquitos in the twilight float
like random thoughts: drift over
the water like seagulls ready to nest:
drift and wander in gathering night:
weightless, random meanderings
at the end of the day. . .
_____________________
And thanks to all of you who attended last night's rattle-read by Master Poets Susan Kelly-DeWitt and Victoria Dalkey. The joint was jammed, but Man! can those ladies write (and read!). Medusa was so proud...
Coming up tomorrow: The Snake doubles his staff!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
*Poetry Unplugged tonight at Luna's, 1414 16th, Sac, 8-ish
*PWJ Publishing presents the Skyway Poets, featuring Joy Harold Helsing and her new book, Confessions of the Hare and other old tales, in a reading on Saturday at 7 p.m. at Art, Etc., 122 W. Third Street, Chico, California. 530-895-1161. Other poets include Patricia Wellingham-Jones, Audrey C. Small, Sally Allen McNall, Lara Gularte, Ann Doro and Kathleen McPartland.
*Poems-for-All Saturday night at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sac, 7:30: Frank Andrick, Michelle Tea, Rachel Savage and Rachel Leibrock.
*Sunday's Pomo Literati (two-hour quarterly radio program) hosted by Frank Andrick: KUSF 90.3, SF (www.kusf.org); 2-4 pm. A plethora of poets, live or on tape. It's Frank Andrick's birthday bash!
*Sac Poetry Center presents Brad Buchanan (see my earlier posting) at HQ (25th and R, Sac), 7:30 pm. on Monday. Here is another wee sample from Brad:
QUIET ALERT
—Brad Buchanan
Not sad, but crying,
the baby is signaling
her newfound needs—
the world’s in a holding
pattern, and knows it.
We work the angles
of blankets and breastfeeding,
tilt at the windmills
of burping, navigate
the pink circumference
under a diaper,
discover the truth behind
rumors of new uprisings
from the south,
decode the morsels
that drop from her mouth,
and then relax all the way
back to delight
seeing her eyes open,
quiet, alert.
___________________
Thanks, Brad!
Meanwhile, I continue to perserverate on the genocide of mosquitos. Herewith is an ode of my own:
MOSQUITOS OVER THE WATER
—Kathy Kieth, Fair Oaks
hover in the twilight: land
on the meniscus of the dark
pond, then lift off again—lift
without getting caught, without
being pulled under by watery
claws that tug at small feet: under-
tow that drags them, tries to suck
tiny pontoons down into its teary
darkness, its black, watery arms. . .
Mosquitos in the twilight float
like random thoughts: drift over
the water like seagulls ready to nest:
drift and wander in gathering night:
weightless, random meanderings
at the end of the day. . .
_____________________
And thanks to all of you who attended last night's rattle-read by Master Poets Susan Kelly-DeWitt and Victoria Dalkey. The joint was jammed, but Man! can those ladies write (and read!). Medusa was so proud...
Coming up tomorrow: The Snake doubles his staff!
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Wednesday, August 10, 2005
Tonight's the Night!
Join us at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento tonight for the release of chapbooks by Susan Kelly-DeWitt (The Land) and Victoria Dalkey (In the Absence of Silver). Both of these nationally-acclaimed poets (and local poetry icons) will be reading and celebrating the publication of Rattlechaps #12 and #14 from Rattlesnake Press, beginning at 7:30 (free). Refreshments and a read-around will follow; bring your own poetry or somebody else's.
Davis poet/publisher/raconteur James Lee Jobe writes the following:
I'm very much looking forward to this reading. I haven't heard Ms Dalkey read in years, not since the SPC had its readings at Dukes. Below is a poem I wrote at a Dalkey reading at Dukes in the 1990s. The other feature was the mother of that artist who used to go with Patrick Grizzell. I have forgotten their names. Both poets had marijuana poems that night, and the image of these two sweet, mature ladies getting high wandered into my poem. The open mike after the
featured readers was particularly horrid.
SOME LINES AT AN OPEN-MIKE READING
—James Lee Jobe, Davis
Old women smoke marijuana in the alley, their breath
horrid,
their armpit hair is long and braided, decorated with
jewels.
Their hair and eyes are the night sky of Egypt! Their
little feet
are petals from jungle flowers, picked by bored
monkeys!
Here, on stage, a poet reads some endless lines, and I
don't care.
In my mind I join the women in the alley, it is
sunset; just look at the sky.
________________________
Thanks, Jim! Watch for more from The Jobester in the near future, starting with a reading Sept. 9 (more about that later) and a rattlechap in early 2006.
—Medusa (whose alley days are over, I'm afraid...)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Davis poet/publisher/raconteur James Lee Jobe writes the following:
I'm very much looking forward to this reading. I haven't heard Ms Dalkey read in years, not since the SPC had its readings at Dukes. Below is a poem I wrote at a Dalkey reading at Dukes in the 1990s. The other feature was the mother of that artist who used to go with Patrick Grizzell. I have forgotten their names. Both poets had marijuana poems that night, and the image of these two sweet, mature ladies getting high wandered into my poem. The open mike after the
featured readers was particularly horrid.
SOME LINES AT AN OPEN-MIKE READING
—James Lee Jobe, Davis
Old women smoke marijuana in the alley, their breath
horrid,
their armpit hair is long and braided, decorated with
jewels.
Their hair and eyes are the night sky of Egypt! Their
little feet
are petals from jungle flowers, picked by bored
monkeys!
Here, on stage, a poet reads some endless lines, and I
don't care.
In my mind I join the women in the alley, it is
sunset; just look at the sky.
________________________
Thanks, Jim! Watch for more from The Jobester in the near future, starting with a reading Sept. 9 (more about that later) and a rattlechap in early 2006.
—Medusa (whose alley days are over, I'm afraid...)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
Are We Toast?
Did you get sprayed? Did the crop dusters buzz over your head last night, dumping their derring-do on the mosquitos? On the spray map, it looks like they just missed my house—theoretically (though I did hear the planes). One wonders how many of us are "toast"—is it really just the hapless mosquitos?
Enough editorializing. We need some whimsy. Here are some poems about toast from The New Oxford Book of Children's Verse.
THE TOASTER
—William Jay Smith
A silver-scaled Dragon with jaws flaming red
Sits at my elbow and toasts my bread.
I hand him fat slices, and then, one by one,
He hands them back when he sees they are done.
THREE LITTLE GHOSTESSES
—Anonymous, English
Three little ghostesses
Sitting on postesses,
Eating buttered toastesses,
Greasing their fistesses,
Up to the wristesses,
Oh, what beastesses
To make such feastesses!
POEM ON BREAD
—Vernon Scannell
The poet is about to write a poem;
He does not use a pencil or a pen.
He dips his long, thin finger into jam
Or something savoury preferred by men.
This poet does not choose to write on paper;
He takes a single slice of well-baked bread
And with his jam or marmite-nibbed forefinger
He writes his verses down on that instead.
His poem is fairly short as all the best are.
When he has finished it he hopes that you
Or someone else—your brother, friend or sister—
Will read and find it marvelous and true.
If you can't read, then eat: it tastes quite good.
If you do neither, all that I can say
Is he who needs no poetry or bread
Is really in a devilish bad way.
_______________________
Here's hoping your poems today are written in jam, or something else savoury...
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Enough editorializing. We need some whimsy. Here are some poems about toast from The New Oxford Book of Children's Verse.
THE TOASTER
—William Jay Smith
A silver-scaled Dragon with jaws flaming red
Sits at my elbow and toasts my bread.
I hand him fat slices, and then, one by one,
He hands them back when he sees they are done.
THREE LITTLE GHOSTESSES
—Anonymous, English
Three little ghostesses
Sitting on postesses,
Eating buttered toastesses,
Greasing their fistesses,
Up to the wristesses,
Oh, what beastesses
To make such feastesses!
POEM ON BREAD
—Vernon Scannell
The poet is about to write a poem;
He does not use a pencil or a pen.
He dips his long, thin finger into jam
Or something savoury preferred by men.
This poet does not choose to write on paper;
He takes a single slice of well-baked bread
And with his jam or marmite-nibbed forefinger
He writes his verses down on that instead.
His poem is fairly short as all the best are.
When he has finished it he hopes that you
Or someone else—your brother, friend or sister—
Will read and find it marvelous and true.
If you can't read, then eat: it tastes quite good.
If you do neither, all that I can say
Is he who needs no poetry or bread
Is really in a devilish bad way.
_______________________
Here's hoping your poems today are written in jam, or something else savoury...
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Monday, August 08, 2005
Dances in Walla Walla
SEVEN SISTERS, 1919
—Victoria Dalkey, Sacramento
They thought they were wood nymphs
those girls in Isadora frocks.
Alice and her six sisters,
gossamer scarves trailing
through tall trees
in shafts of sunlight.
They sang as they spun
around in the trees and dreamed
of dances in Walla Walla
and halls of flowers
at the county fair.
Oh it was rare
the way they turned
and tumbled in the air
white arms raised
as they spun around and sang
their old Greek song.
_____________________
Victoria Dalkey’s poems have appeared in Abraxas, bakunin, Birmingham Review, Cimarron Review, Napa Review, and other small press publications. Her chapbook, Twenty-Nine Poems, was published in 1999 by Red Wing Press. Since 1976, she has written reviews, interviews and feature articles about art for The Sacramento Bee. Come celebrate the release of her latest chapbook, In the Absence of Silver, from Rattlesnake Press at The Book Collector (1008 24th St., Sac.) this coming Wednesday (August 10), 7:30 pm.
The Sacramento Poetry Center sponsors an open mic tonight, Open Mic with Lemonade, hosted by Bob Stanley at HQ for the Arts, 25th and R Sts., Sac., 7:30pm.
And one week from today (8/15) is the next deadline for Rattlesnake Review. Send 3-5 poems by snail (4708 Tree Shadow Place, Fair Oaks, 95628) or e-mail (kathykieth@hotmail.com). No cover letters, no simul-subs, no previously-pubs. The Snake also publishes artwork and photographs, and interviews, reviews, and articles, too (please query first for the prose stuff). More later in the week about exciting additions for the next issue!
—Medusa (hi, Sammie!)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
—Victoria Dalkey, Sacramento
They thought they were wood nymphs
those girls in Isadora frocks.
Alice and her six sisters,
gossamer scarves trailing
through tall trees
in shafts of sunlight.
They sang as they spun
around in the trees and dreamed
of dances in Walla Walla
and halls of flowers
at the county fair.
Oh it was rare
the way they turned
and tumbled in the air
white arms raised
as they spun around and sang
their old Greek song.
_____________________
Victoria Dalkey’s poems have appeared in Abraxas, bakunin, Birmingham Review, Cimarron Review, Napa Review, and other small press publications. Her chapbook, Twenty-Nine Poems, was published in 1999 by Red Wing Press. Since 1976, she has written reviews, interviews and feature articles about art for The Sacramento Bee. Come celebrate the release of her latest chapbook, In the Absence of Silver, from Rattlesnake Press at The Book Collector (1008 24th St., Sac.) this coming Wednesday (August 10), 7:30 pm.
The Sacramento Poetry Center sponsors an open mic tonight, Open Mic with Lemonade, hosted by Bob Stanley at HQ for the Arts, 25th and R Sts., Sac., 7:30pm.
And one week from today (8/15) is the next deadline for Rattlesnake Review. Send 3-5 poems by snail (4708 Tree Shadow Place, Fair Oaks, 95628) or e-mail (kathykieth@hotmail.com). No cover letters, no simul-subs, no previously-pubs. The Snake also publishes artwork and photographs, and interviews, reviews, and articles, too (please query first for the prose stuff). More later in the week about exciting additions for the next issue!
—Medusa (hi, Sammie!)
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Sunday, August 07, 2005
Friendship Day
The Hallmark greeting card website says today is Friendship Day. Gorgons are not known for their loving personalities, but Medusa carries a huge pack of gratitude on her back for all her friends, many of whom are reading this today. Thank you. The Snake thrives because of Friends.
It is also Joyce Odam's birthday, a perfection of serendipity! Joyce is my friend. I'm very proud to say that. She has a beautiful spirit.
Joyce is also a dear friend of Sacramento poetry. She is a wonderful poet and teacher.
Joyce is also a friend of the national/international poetry scene, having published widely over the past XXX years, both her own poetry and several outstanding literary journals.
Write to Joyce, or call her today and say Happy Birthday. Last year at this time, we made a big hoopla about her 80th; another year is an even bigger milestone. Celebrate it with me!
And here's Joyce's cogent comment on the current heat storm:
RUNNING THE FAN ALL NIGHT
—Joyce Odam, Sacramento
So it's midnight now—
a hot summer night—
neighborhood sounds
fading in and out the window,
the noisy fan making wobbly circles,
the two crows
hanging from it
trembling with vibration.
So much is loud in summer:
the sleepless,
the dead,
their thoughts fusing.
So much is spilled across a page of white paper:
the fact of midnight—a hot summer night—
neighborhood sounds
fading in and out the window.
__________________
Love to you, Joyce. And thanks.
—Medusa
It is also Joyce Odam's birthday, a perfection of serendipity! Joyce is my friend. I'm very proud to say that. She has a beautiful spirit.
Joyce is also a dear friend of Sacramento poetry. She is a wonderful poet and teacher.
Joyce is also a friend of the national/international poetry scene, having published widely over the past XXX years, both her own poetry and several outstanding literary journals.
Write to Joyce, or call her today and say Happy Birthday. Last year at this time, we made a big hoopla about her 80th; another year is an even bigger milestone. Celebrate it with me!
And here's Joyce's cogent comment on the current heat storm:
RUNNING THE FAN ALL NIGHT
—Joyce Odam, Sacramento
So it's midnight now—
a hot summer night—
neighborhood sounds
fading in and out the window,
the noisy fan making wobbly circles,
the two crows
hanging from it
trembling with vibration.
So much is loud in summer:
the sleepless,
the dead,
their thoughts fusing.
So much is spilled across a page of white paper:
the fact of midnight—a hot summer night—
neighborhood sounds
fading in and out the window.
__________________
Love to you, Joyce. And thanks.
—Medusa
Saturday, August 06, 2005
How to Stay Sane?
Rattlesnake Press is as proud as can be of its two latest rattlechaps, both of which will be released at a reading at 7:30 pm this WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 10 at The Book Collector, 1008 24th Street, Sac. One is Victoria Dalkey's In the Absence of Silver, and the other is Susan Kelly-DeWitt's The Land. Susan has been a magnificent force on the local scene with her USC Extension workshops and her wonderful poetry, and she publishes widely on the national level, as well. Here is a sample from Susan's new book:
DOGWOOD, SPRING, 2003
—Susan Kelly-DeWitt, Sacramento
How to stay sane in such a heartbroken spring
when the dogwood blossoms fly apart, a shrapnel of white petals,
when bodies fester in a blistering dune far away
and bread has run out and oil fires smolder,
when the Archer shrouds his bowstring in a black cloud
and hundreds of flares mimic lethal night suns,
when lizards carry the only grains of news across vast deserts
and stories creep like ants out of the scorched gardens.
You open your eyes to the morning brilliance
and even the ordinary flowering of April seems like a lie
by men in command, who manipulate the repulsive puppet
strings of absolute power deep inside the earth,
just as you feared.
___________________
Thanks, Susan! (More about Victoria's book later.) Also premiering on August 10 will be VYPER!—the journal for teen poetry, on which Asst. Wrangler Robbie Grossklaus has done a very fine job.
The 19th annual Focus on Writers Contest, which is sponsored by the Friends of the Sacramento Public Library, awards cash prizes for short stories, poems, articles, first chapters of novels and young-adult books. Submit up to five unpublished manuscripts ($5 per manuscript); deadline is AUGUST 31. Info: www.saclibrary.org or 916-264-2880.
PWJ Publishing presents the Skyway Poets, featuring Joy Harold Helsing and her new book, Confessions of the Hare and other old tales, in a reading on AUGUST 13—that's next Saturday—at 7 p.m. at Art, Etc., 122 W. Third Street, Chico, California. 530-895-1161. Other poets include Patricia Wellingham-Jones, Audrey C. Small, Sally Allen McNall, Lara Gularte, Ann Doro and Kathleen McPartland. Take a ride up that way and check into what our north-Valley friends are up to...
Jane Blue has sent me a terrific picture of a local Medusa! Don't forget that the Snake prints photographs, too. Next deadline is 8/15.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
DOGWOOD, SPRING, 2003
—Susan Kelly-DeWitt, Sacramento
How to stay sane in such a heartbroken spring
when the dogwood blossoms fly apart, a shrapnel of white petals,
when bodies fester in a blistering dune far away
and bread has run out and oil fires smolder,
when the Archer shrouds his bowstring in a black cloud
and hundreds of flares mimic lethal night suns,
when lizards carry the only grains of news across vast deserts
and stories creep like ants out of the scorched gardens.
You open your eyes to the morning brilliance
and even the ordinary flowering of April seems like a lie
by men in command, who manipulate the repulsive puppet
strings of absolute power deep inside the earth,
just as you feared.
___________________
Thanks, Susan! (More about Victoria's book later.) Also premiering on August 10 will be VYPER!—the journal for teen poetry, on which Asst. Wrangler Robbie Grossklaus has done a very fine job.
The 19th annual Focus on Writers Contest, which is sponsored by the Friends of the Sacramento Public Library, awards cash prizes for short stories, poems, articles, first chapters of novels and young-adult books. Submit up to five unpublished manuscripts ($5 per manuscript); deadline is AUGUST 31. Info: www.saclibrary.org or 916-264-2880.
PWJ Publishing presents the Skyway Poets, featuring Joy Harold Helsing and her new book, Confessions of the Hare and other old tales, in a reading on AUGUST 13—that's next Saturday—at 7 p.m. at Art, Etc., 122 W. Third Street, Chico, California. 530-895-1161. Other poets include Patricia Wellingham-Jones, Audrey C. Small, Sally Allen McNall, Lara Gularte, Ann Doro and Kathleen McPartland. Take a ride up that way and check into what our north-Valley friends are up to...
Jane Blue has sent me a terrific picture of a local Medusa! Don't forget that the Snake prints photographs, too. Next deadline is 8/15.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
Friday, August 05, 2005
Emustina—Awesome!
Taylor Graham took the challenge to write a sestina about emus, though she says,
"I tried my darnedest to get that bird into the poem, but you know how a sestina is, it goes where IT wants to go..."
AN EMU FEATHER FOR A LADY’S HAT
—Taylor Graham, Somerset
She took a class in millinery once,
and kept all manner of satins in a box,
and grosgrain ribbon, and silk flowers.
She had a wooden statue of a head
without a human feature, but it fit
her hat-size and sat upon a shelf.
She lined her hats up on that shelf
and brought them down and wore them once.
But somehow they never seemed to fit
the next occasion. Bonnet or pillbox,
they so briefly graced her head,
then withered like so many flowers.
But fashions change like flowers,
brief as exotic birds. Her shelf,
now empty, gathered dust above her head.
All the finery she cherished once
went down to the cellar in a box
with a lid that didn’t fit.
And yet, she’d have a perfect fit
if she knew how I keep my flowers
in a mountain meadow, not a box.
I line up hiking boots along the shelf
and haven’t worn a hat, not once,
except in summer to shade my head.
But here’s the family album: head
of household (Father) always fit
and work-tanned; snapped here once
tending his urgent flowers.
And here’s Mother, posed before a shelf
of knickknacks, with a music box
from Italy. And here I am with a box
turtle in my lap, blond head
hatless, sitting on a granite shelf
and dreaming new adventures, or a fit
of temper, or imagining flowers
that bloom more than just this once.
What happened to her shelf of hats?
Her head as if wreathed in flowers,
the once-forever sealed in a box?
_______________________
Hats off—with or without emu feathers—to JTG.
By the way, Colette Jonopulos wrote to Medusa, extolling Hatch's limerick of yesterday, but wondering where the X-rated ones are. Mean lady that she is, she also enclosed a picture of the Oregon coast, enshrouded in cool, damp fog. Let's start the day with a little Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, one of my faves; try to think about cool places as the Fahrenheit creeps back past 100°:
A lovely morning, without the glare of the sun,
the sea in great commotion, chafing and foaming.
So from the bosom of darkness our days come roaring and gleaming,
Chafe and break into foam, sink into darkness again.
But on the shores of Time each leaves some trace of its passage,
Though the succeeding wave washes it out from the sand.
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, from Fragments: August 4, 1856
_________________
Don't forget the Cleos' Summer Showcase tomorrow; check earlier Medusas for info.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.
"I tried my darnedest to get that bird into the poem, but you know how a sestina is, it goes where IT wants to go..."
AN EMU FEATHER FOR A LADY’S HAT
—Taylor Graham, Somerset
She took a class in millinery once,
and kept all manner of satins in a box,
and grosgrain ribbon, and silk flowers.
She had a wooden statue of a head
without a human feature, but it fit
her hat-size and sat upon a shelf.
She lined her hats up on that shelf
and brought them down and wore them once.
But somehow they never seemed to fit
the next occasion. Bonnet or pillbox,
they so briefly graced her head,
then withered like so many flowers.
But fashions change like flowers,
brief as exotic birds. Her shelf,
now empty, gathered dust above her head.
All the finery she cherished once
went down to the cellar in a box
with a lid that didn’t fit.
And yet, she’d have a perfect fit
if she knew how I keep my flowers
in a mountain meadow, not a box.
I line up hiking boots along the shelf
and haven’t worn a hat, not once,
except in summer to shade my head.
But here’s the family album: head
of household (Father) always fit
and work-tanned; snapped here once
tending his urgent flowers.
And here’s Mother, posed before a shelf
of knickknacks, with a music box
from Italy. And here I am with a box
turtle in my lap, blond head
hatless, sitting on a granite shelf
and dreaming new adventures, or a fit
of temper, or imagining flowers
that bloom more than just this once.
What happened to her shelf of hats?
Her head as if wreathed in flowers,
the once-forever sealed in a box?
_______________________
Hats off—with or without emu feathers—to JTG.
By the way, Colette Jonopulos wrote to Medusa, extolling Hatch's limerick of yesterday, but wondering where the X-rated ones are. Mean lady that she is, she also enclosed a picture of the Oregon coast, enshrouded in cool, damp fog. Let's start the day with a little Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, one of my faves; try to think about cool places as the Fahrenheit creeps back past 100°:
A lovely morning, without the glare of the sun,
the sea in great commotion, chafing and foaming.
So from the bosom of darkness our days come roaring and gleaming,
Chafe and break into foam, sink into darkness again.
But on the shores of Time each leaves some trace of its passage,
Though the succeeding wave washes it out from the sand.
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, from Fragments: August 4, 1856
_________________
Don't forget the Cleos' Summer Showcase tomorrow; check earlier Medusas for info.
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets.