Photo by Frank Graham, Sacramento
COLD SUPPER
—Taylor Graham, Somerset
It all started when he called it
"bouillon," the stuff she was boiling
in the pot. Consommé blanc, she sniffs
its savor of well-being, how it tones
the heart, a fact unchanging
as love (she reflects) is not
necessarily. This man with a preference
for Sumac’s easy-listening
over a Bach fugue
(the Emerson String Quartet
just came out with a new collection).
Now from the other room, she hears
a squeak as he swivels his chair,
turns up the volume. Love is,
she suddenly understands, a matter
of aesthetics.
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Thanks, TG, for the response to last Tuesday's Seed of the Week, "It all started..." Today's post owes gratitude to Taylor Graham, Frank Graham (no relation—that we know of...), Carlena Wike and Carol Louise Moon, all frequent contributors to Rattlesnake Review and Medusa's Kitchen. Watch for more of their work in Issue #19 of the Snake, due out in mid-September. And EEEEK! The deadline is tomorrow (August 15) to get your work in for this issue! E-mail 3-5 poems plus photos, artwork, cogent quotes, etc. to kathykieth@hotmail.com or snail 'em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726.
Special SPC reading tonight:
•••Thursday (8/14), 7 PM [note time change!]: Sacramento Poetry Center presents a special reading with Dan Guerra, Alex Stephens and Mary Rosenberry at HQ for the Arts, 1719 25th St., Sacramento. [See yesterday's post for bios.]
Addition to this weekend's calendar: Cowboy up!
The cowgirl in Medusa loves cowboy poets and cowboy poetry. Cowboy up this weekend on Saturday (8/16), at 7:30, when The Nevada County Poetry Series presents three of Northern California's All-Star Cowboy Poets: The always requested and national know Larry Maurice, Nevada County's own Karen Macy and, out of Oroville, with his dry-western humor and quirky catalog of life's experiences—the forever-loved Jim Cardwell. Bill Gainer says, "These folks bring the Cowboy Way and the Western Spirit to life, they know how to do the job and they do it. They are who we are! They invite us all to let the Cowboy within live forever!"
Larry Maurice has spent the last twenty years as a Cowboy, horse wrangler and packer in the Eastern Sierra and the high deserts of Nevada. You’re likely to find him leading a string of mules into the backcountry, on a horse drive in the Owens Valley of California, or working with the longhorn cattle in Virginia City, Nevada. Over the last few years, Larry has had to juggle his need to be on horseback with his busy entertainment schedule. Larry is a sought-after entertainer, not only for his Cowboy Poetry that speaks from the heart of the day-to-day Cowboy, but also for his ability to breathe life into the history of the American West. Larry has hosted television specials for the Fox network, one in conjunction with the Reno Rodeo and another in conjunction with his one man show, "Cowboy: The Spirit, The Lore, The Legacy". In July of 2000, Larry received the Academy of Western Artists coveted “Will Rogers Cowboy Award” for Cowboy Poet of the Year. His CD’s have received great reviews and in 1996, 1998 and 2000 were nominated for “Album of the Year” by the Academy of Western Artists and in 2004 he received the prestigious "American Cowboy Culture Award" presented by the "Lubbock Cowboy Symposium" for lifetime achievement in "Cowboy Poetry."
Karen Macy was formally known as “Klip Joint Karen”. For 23 years she was the entertaining hairdresser of Pine Street, in Nevada City. She’s always been a poet, but started writing verse with a “gallop” after attending the Elko Cowboy Poetry Gathering ten years ago. She has presented in Elko, the Auburn Rodeo, the Horseman’s, the Rotary, and the Lightening “W”, in Carson City. She thanks her cowboy husband, Dave, for the times she fell off a horse, for calf poop in her hair and for the bull that took her for a walk. A true cowgirl!
After returning from military service and completing college, Jim Cardwell found himself embracing the rural lifestyle and the idea of living off the land. That dream first led him to a cabin on the San Juan Ridge, then to an olive orchard in the foothills near Oroville. Jim says, “I wanted to raise produce (his salsa is locally famous) and livestock, but mostly I’ve raised kids.” Jim works as an fulltime emergency room nurse and as a part-time Cowboy on seasonal cattle round-ups at the Amaril Ranch in Williams. He has been writing and presenting Cowboy Poetry for ten years. His work has appeared in The Acorn, Poetalk and Zambomba! and he continues to perform at Elko, Visalia, Colusa, Monterey and other Cowboy Gatherings. Jim is a four-time winner of the humor award at the Berkeley Poet’s Dinner Contest.
Tickets can be purchased at the door for $10 general, seniors and students, and $1 for those under 18. Refreshments and open-mic included. The show will be in the main theater at the Center for the Arts, 314 W. Main St., Grass Valley, CA. For more information call (530) 432-8196 or (530) 274-8384.
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B.L.'s Drive-bys: A Micro-Review by B.L. Kennedy
Emily Dickinson
By Cynthia Griffin Wolff
635 pages, Trade-paper $18
Perseus Books
The one thing that is great about reviewing books for the Snake is that I get to discover titles that I had either missed or just didn’t have the time or opportunity to encounter in past years. And this is indeed the case of author Cynthia Griffin Wolff’s excellent, brilliant and well-researched biography of Emily Dickinson. For those readers who are hardcore fans of Dickinson and her poetry, well, you can stop reading here because I'm sure you have already been exposed to this wonderful biography. But for those who have yet to explore the life and work of this gifted poet, well, read on. Cynthia Griffin Wolff’s biography of the American poet is without a doubt the single best introduction to Emily Dickinson that I can recommend to you, for here is a literary biography that sings with intricate style and grace; it is an engrossing and important study of the archeology of the poet’s psyche and a fascinating read as well. So, if you happen to be standing in your local bookstore without a thing to do and you are in need of a good read, ask your bookseller or store clerk to pull a copy of Cynthia Griffin Wolff’s excellent biography of Emily Dickinson off the shelf. I promise that it will be time and money well-spent.
—B.L. Kennedy, Reviewer-in-Residence
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DEGAS DISCOVERS EGRETS
—Carlena Wike, Elk Grove
Elegant, pensive, poised
they assume their positions
as though choreographed.
He imagines music
to set them all in motion—
strains of Swan Lake, Le Cygne,
gently lofting their wings
in an homage to Pavlova.
Their Ballanchine bodies
are adorned in feathers,
their long necks curved just so
or bent, as though checking a pointe.
Only their plumage stirs
in the subtle shifts of air
wafting off the sunlit shimmer
of the rippled stage.
He gives up blinking, hardly breathes,
aches for brush, for canvas,
to capture the exquisite drama
of this energy held in check.
As he imagines the maestro
raising a baton to release
the first strains of an overture
one sharp yellow beak breaks rank,
dispels all misconception
pierces the dark mud
of the rice field
to retrieve a crayfish.
___________________
SUMMER SERVICE
—Carlena Wike
The baby in the back row is nursed—
the man in the third row
has calmed his persistent cough
while the sleeper in row five
twitches periodically
and prepares to snore.
I stare doggedly
at the speaker
but am called away
by the scent of
the lady behind me
and the color
of the foreign gentleman’s tie.
Slapping at the heat
with my program,
I stare humidly
at a fly
climbing the sun-caked window
toward heaven.
__________________
STACKED
—Carol Louise Moon, Sacramento
From the tailbone up—
from the skull down—
makes no difference,
Clacketty-crack.
I sit on my tailbone
spelling the word "coccyx"
typing a poem about bones:
Ours Are the Many Rocks
The vertebral column,
Clacketty-crack. The many rocks
stacked on top of each other;
holes surrounded by calcium.
The spinal cord is a bass string
(a delicate thing).
Better to crack a back
than a lousy joke.
Knock, knock. Who's there?
Patella.
Patella who? Patella Lie.
A knee-jerk reaction.
A piteous excuse of a drilled rock necklace
dangling from a singing skull.
"Thank God, the spine is intact!"
exclaimed mister doctor-actor.
Between you and me and the bones:
that makes two spines.
Clacketty-crack.
"Why... a snake, of course."
__________________
BLACK PLASTIC PALLETS
—Carol Louise Moon
I see huge black plastic—
layers of large squares stacked
and skating ominously
through the grocery store
on small wheels.
Thick and huge and huge and thick.
I see them transported back and forth
in and out of swinging doors.
I wonder what they weigh.
Wonder what they cost.
They must be trading them on
the black market, because they're
black and they're in the market.
Someone's trading them
for wood ones. They would want
wood ones instead of plastic.
Then they place plastic
instead of wood ones
in their place. The place is full of
black plastic pallets, and
no one's calling the police.
__________________
Today's LittleNip:
Poetry is a sequence of dots and dashes, spelling depths, crypts, cross-lights, and moon wisps.
—Carl Sandburg
_________________
—Medusa
SnakeWatch: What's Up With Rattlesnake Press
The Snake will be snoozing through July and August, leaving Medusa to carry on alone. Then on September 10, we shall burst back onto the scene with Thirteen Poems, a new chapbook from Patrick Grizzell; #2 in Katy Brown's series of blank journals (Musings2: Vices, Virtues and Obsessions); a littlesnake broadside (Wind Physics) from Jordan Reynolds; plus Issue #19 of Rattlesnake Review (deadline is August 15). Meanwhile, look in on Medusa every day, and, for heaven's sake, keep sending stuff! The snakes of Medusa are always hungry...
Medusa's Weekly Menu:
(Contributors are welcome to cook up something for any and all of these!)
Monday: Weekly NorCal poetry calendar
Tuesday: Seed of the Week: Tuesday is Medusa's day to post poetry triggers such as quotes, forms, photos, memories, jokes—whatever might tickle somebody's muse. Pick up the gauntlet and send in your poetic results; and don't be shy about sending in your own triggers, too! All poems will be posted and a few of them will go into Medusa's Corner of each Rattlesnake Review. Send your work to kathykieth@hotmail.com or P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726. No deadline for SOW; respond today, tomorrow, or whenever the muse arrives. (Print 'em out, maybe, save 'em for a dry spell?) When you send us work, though, just let us know which "seed" it was that inspired you.
Wednesday (sometimes): HandyStuff Quickies: Resources for the poet, including whatever helps ease the pain of writing and/or publishing: favorite journals to read and/or submit to; books, etc., about writing; organizational tools—you know—HandyStuff! Tell us about your favorite tools.
Thursday: B.L.'s Drive-Bys: Micro-reviews by our irreverent Reviewer-in-Residence, B.L. Kennedy. Send books, CDs, DVDs, etc. to him for possible review (either as a Drive-By or in future issues of Rattlesnake Review) at P.O. Box 160664, Sacramento, CA 95816.
Friday: NorCal weekend poetry calendar
Daily (except Sunday): LittleNips: SnakeFood for the Poetic Soul: Daily munchables for poetic thought, including short paragraphs, quotes, wonky words, silliness, little-known poetry/poet facts, and other inspiration—yet another way to feed our ravenous poetic souls.
And poetry! Every day, poetry from writers near and far! The Snakes of Medusa are always hungry.......!
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Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events, to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.) Medusa cannot vouch for the moral fiber of other publications, contests, etc. that she lists, however, so submit to them at your own risk. For more info about the Snake Empire, including guidelines for submitting to or obtaining our publications, click on the link to the right of this column: Rattlesnake Press (rattlesnakepress.com). And be sure to sign up for Snakebytes, our monthly e-newsletter that will keep you up-to-date on all our ophidian chicanery.