Right Back to the Roots

SOMETIMES IT ALL WORKS OUT
—William S. Gainer, Grass Valley

There’s an odd guy
that used to live around here.
He lost his tongue in the war,
had trouble communicating.
They sent him
one of those phones
for the disabled,
but it was for a blind guy,
had Braille buttons.
He had trouble
calling to complain,
had to write a letter,
“What are ya, a fucking idiot?
I don’t have a tongue,
now send over the right phone.”
I heard he became a drummer
for a punk rock band,
they thought he was into self-mutilation,
figured he'd fit right in.
They say he made lots of money,
got a tattoo,
bought himself a prosthesis.
I heard the color is almost
a perfect match.

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The irreverent Bill Gainer will read at Poetry Unplugged tomorrow night, along with Ann Menebroker and Neeli Cherkovski. That's 8 PM on Thursday at Luna's Cafe, 1414 16th St., Sac. Open mic before and after.


Tonight:

•••Weds. (11/29), 10 PM-midnight: Mics and Moods at Capitol Garage, 1500 K St., Sac. Features and open mic, hosted by Khiry Malik. 21 years of age and older; $5 cover. Info: 916-492-9336 or www.malikspeaks.com.

•••Weds. (11/29), 6 PM: The Hidden Passage poetry series meets in Placerville. This is an open mic/read-around; bring your poems or somebody else's. Address is 352 Main St., Placerville.


Calendar addition for tomorrow night:

Thursday (11/30), 7-9:30 PM: The Writers Read Poetry Series meets at the Colored Horse Studio, 780 Waugh Lane, Ukiah. This Thursday evening, Writers Read presents a special reading by seven authors whose work appears in Reads: An Anthology of Writings by The Lakeside Writers Guild. If time permits, an open mike session will follow the featured reading. Refreshments available. Donation requested. For more info: (707)275-9010 or (707)463-6989. This event is sponsored by Poets & Writers, Inc. through a grant from the James Irvine Foundation, and by Tenacity Press and Colored Horse Studio.


Get your tickets NOW:

I Began To Speak, a movie of the history of poetry in the City of Sacramento c. 1960 to 2006, features some 41 area poets who tell the story of the evolution of a single poetry community in their own voices. Produced, written and directed by B.L. Kennedy, with Linda Thorell as Director of Photography, Editing and Design, and funded in part by an ArtScapes Grant from the Sacramento Metropolitan Arts Commission, this unique film will premier at the legendary Crest Theatre in the heart of downtown Sacramento on Wednesday, December 6 at 7 PM. Advance tickets now on sale at the Crest, 1013 K St., Sac., 916-442-5189 or sid@thecrest.com. Tickets are $10, and can also be purchased via ticket agencies like www.tickets.com—though you save on fees if you buy them directly from the Crest. Limited seating, so get your tickets now!

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Here's another poem from the interesting Pascale Petit:

WHAT SHE WANTED
—Pascale Petit

What she wanted was to return
to the original rainforest

hear water pushing
through the sapwood

and leaves eating light
as she wanted to eat light.

She knew her nature
was to be water, not wood.

She knew there was a grove
of vertical rivers

of roaring waterfall-trees,
and a grove of whirlpool-trees

with vortices she could dive through,
past the hollow years of her life

right back to the roots.

______________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry, photos and art, and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com 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.)

The Moon With a Serpent's Mouth

THE GARDEN OF LOVE
—William Blake

I went to the Garden of Love,
And saw what I never had seen:
A Chapel was built in the midst,
Where I used to play on the green.

And the gates of this Chapel were shut,
And 'Thou shalt not' writ over the door;
So I turn'd to the Garden of Love
That so many sweet flowers bore;

And I saw it was filled with graves,
And tomb-stones where flowers should be;
And Priests in black gowns were walking their rounds,
And binding with briars my joys & desires.

_______________________

Yikes. Been there! Today William Blake would've been 249 years old.

The crush of a busy Tuesday:

•••As usual, the Davis folks have been shy in advertising their readers. Tonight (11/28), 8:30 PM: Joshua McKinney, distinguished poet and Sac State English professor, will read from his work as part of Bistro 33's on-going "Literature Night" series. Bistro 33, 3rd and F Sts., Davis. Open mic to follow.

•••Members of The Great American Pinup web journal (greatamericanpinup.blogspot.com) will be reading at The Sacramento Poetry Center TONIGHT at 7:30 PM, HQ for the Arts, 1719 25th St., Sacramento. Those reading will include David Koehn, Shawn Pittard, Victor Schnickelfritz, and Geraldine Kim (winner of the 2005 Fence Books Award). Plus recordings of Matthew Schmeer [Kansas City] and Richard Jeffrey Newman [New York].

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GACELA OF THE DARK DEATH
—Federico Garcia Lorca

I want to sleep the dream of the apples,
to withdraw from the tumult of cemeteries,
I want to sleep the dream of that child
who wanted to cut his heart on the high seas.

I don't want to hear again that the dead do not lose their blood,
that the putrid mouth goes on asking for water.
I don't want to learn of the tortures of the grass,
nor of the moon with a serpent's mouth
that labors before dawn.

I want to sleep awhile,
awhile, a minute, a century;
but all must know that I have not died;
that there is a stable of gold in my lips;
that I am the small friend of the West wind;
that I am the immense shadow of my tears.

Cover me at dawn with a veil,
because dawn will throw fistfuls of ants at me,
and wet with hard water my shoes
so that the pincers of the scorpion slide.

For I want to sleep the dream of the apples,
to learn a lament that will cleanse me of the earth;
for I want to live with that dark child
who wanted to cut his heart on the high seas.

(translated from the Spanish by Stephen Spender and J.L. Gili)

_______________________

GACELA OF THE FLIGHT
—Federico Garcia Lorca

I have lost myself in the sea many times
with my ear full of freshly cut flowers,
with my tongue full of love and agony.
I have lost myself in the sea many times
as I lost myself in the heart of certain children.

There is no one who in giving a kiss
does not feel the smile of faceless people,
and no one who in touching a newborn child
forgets the motionless skulls of horses.

Because the roses seach in the forehead
for a hard landscape of bone
and the hands of man have no other purpose
than to imitate the roots below the earth.

As I lose myself in the heart of certain children,
I have lost myself in the sea many times.
Ignorant of the water I go seeking
a death full of light to consume me.

(translated by Stephen Spender and J.L. Gili)

_______________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry, photos and art, and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com 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.)

Huge Thursday

GACELA OF UNFORESEEN LOVE
—Federico Garcia Lorca

No one understood the perfume
of the dark magnolia of your womb.
No one knew that you tormented
a hummingbird of love between your teeth.

A thousand Persian ponies fell asleep
in the moonlit plaza of your forehead,
while through four nights I embraced
your waist, enemy of the snow.

Between plaster and jasmines, your glance
was a pale branch of seeds.
I sought in my heart to give you
the ivory letters that say always,

always, always: garden of my agony,
your body elusive always,
the blood of your veins in my mouth,
your mouth already lightless for my death.

(translated from the Spanish by W.S. Merwin)

_______________________

GACELA OF THE TERRIBLE PRESENCE
—Federico Garcia Lorca

I want the water reft from its bed,
I want the wind left without valleys.

I want the night left without eyes
and my heart without the flower of gold.

And the oxen to speak with great leaves
and the earthworm to perish of shadow.

And the teeth of the skull to glisten
and the yellows to overflow the silk.

I can see the duel of the wounded night
writhing in battle with noon.

I resist a setting of green venom
and the broken arches where time suffers.

But do not illumine your clear nude
like a black cactus open in the reeds.

Leave me in an anguish of dark planets,
but do not show me your cool waist.

(translated by W.S. Merwin)

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Check out Thursday!

Lots going on this week, most of it on Thursday:

•••Don't forget that the Monday night Sacramento Poetry Center reading has been moved to Tuesday this week! Members of The Great American Pinup web journal (greatamericanpinup.blogspot.com) will be reading at The Sacramento Poetry Center on TUESDAY, Nov. 28 at 7:30 PM, HQ for the Arts, 1719 25th St., Sacramento. Live (!) members reading will include David Koehn, Shawn Pittard, Victor Schnickelfritz, and Geraldine Kim (winner of the 2005 Fence Books Award). Plus recordings of Matthew Schmeer [Kansas City] and Richard Jeffrey Newman [New York].

•••Tonight (Monday, 11/27), 8 PM: The Moody Blues Poetry Series presents Alta Raye at "A Taste of Laguna", 9080 Laguna Main in Laguna. $5, open mic. Hosted by Ms. LaRue, music by DJ Barney B.

•••Weds. (11/29), 10 PM-midnight: Mics and Moods at Capitol Garage, 1500 K St., Sac. Features and open mic, hosted by Khiry Malik. 21 years of age and older; $5 cover. Info: 916-492-9336 or www.malikspeaks.com.

•••Weds. (11/29), 6 PM: The Hidden Passage poetry series in Placerville, which normally meets on the 4th Wednesday, will shift to November 29 because of Thanksgiving. This is an open mic/read-around; bring your poems or somebody else's. Address is 352 Main St., Placerville.


The big night this week, though, is Thursday, with six of our local heavy-hitters reading—but, unfortunately, not in the same place!

•••8 PM: Poetry Unplugged at Luna's Cafe (1414 16th St., Sac) presents Bill Gainer, Ann Menebroker and Neeli Cherkovski.

•••7 PM: Hidden Passage Bookstore, 352 Main St., Placerville, presents Taylor Graham, reading from her award-winning book, The Downstairs Dance Floor.

•••6-8 PM: The Sacramento Poetry Center's Annual Fall fundraiser features a silent auction, raffle, food, music by Mary Zeppa and Bob Stanley, and poetry by Carol and Laverne Frith. That's $25 in advance or at the door; RSVP Sandra at 916-979-9706 or poetrynow@sacramentopoetrycenter.org. The event will be held at the home of Mimi and Burnett Miller, 1224 40th St., Sac.

•••And if that's not enough, Thursday (11/30), 8-11 PM: Vibe Sessions presents Chas from LA Slam at Cobbler Inn, 3520 Stockton Blvd. (next to Colonial Theater), Sac. $5, hosted by Flo-Real. Open Mic for comedians, singers, poets.

•••Then Sunday (12/3), 6 PM: PoemSpirits will present Albert Garcia & Skunk Talk. December may bring mixed feelings of home and family. Our featured poet Albert Garcia—like Merwin, Hall and Williams—writes on ‘ordinary wonders’ of work, family and rural life with, as Gary Short wrote, “love, complexity, sadness and celebration.” Published in many literary journals, and in U.S. Poet Laureate [and UU] Ted Kooser’s American Life in Poetry column, Albert lives in Wilton, has taught English for 17 years and is Dean of the Language and Literature Division, Sacramento City College. We have invited him to bring his books, Rainshadow and Skunk Talk, to sell. Also, Nora Laila Staklis will present a brief overview of poet and essayist Carolyn Forche, famous for her anthology, Against Forgetting: Twentieth-Century Poetry of Witness, on poetic remembering of events of trauma and tragedy. Free. Location: Location: Unitarian Universalist Society of Sacramento, 2425 Sierra Blvd., 2 blocks north of Fair Oaks Blvd, between Howe and Fulton Avenues; the UUSS Foyer/Lounge. Snacks available. Info: Tom Goff or Nora Staklis, 916-481-3312, or JoAnn Anglin, 916-451-1372. Open mic; All are invited to bring a poem of your own or another’s to read.

________________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry, photos and art, and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com 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.)

Paradise in the Dust

CITY PSALM
—Denise Levertov

The killings continue, each second
pain and misfortune extend themselves
in the genetic chain, injustice is done knowingly, and the air
bears the dust of decayed hopes,
yet breathing those fumes, walking the thronged
pavements among crippled llives, jackhammers
raging, a parking lot painfully agleam
in the May sun, I have seen
not behind but within, within the
dull grief, blown grit, hideous
concrete façades, another grief, a gleam
as of dew, an abode of mercy,
have heard not behind but within noise
a humming that drifted into a quiet smile.
Nothing was changed, all was revealed otherwise;
not that horror was not, not that the killings did not continue;
not that I thought there was to be no more despair,
but that as if transparent all disclosed
an otherness that was blesséd, that was bliss,
I saw Paradise in the dust of the street.

_______________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry, photos and art, and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com 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.)

News From the Ark

A GENERATION
—Gu Cheng (China, 1956-1993)

The pitch black night gave me two deep black eyes
with which to search for light.

(translated from the Chinese by Sam Hammill)

_______________________

DISCOVERY
—Gu Cheng

Of all the people who went into the snowy mountains,
Only Bulin discovered the path.
Though there's just a few meters of it,
Though Venus
Broke a tooth there,
None of this prevented
An Englishman from dying,
Lying in the middle of the road, smiling,
Orchids and tender leaves sprouting
From his ears,
And a rosy glow on his face.

What did that mean?
Bulin frowned
And at last he remembered:
When he was nine, he had come
To spend summer, and had planted a box of matches.
They sprouted, and bore
Berries the size of match heads.
The Englishman gobbled them up
Out of greed.

What a discovery!
Unprecedented, perhaps—
the berry a match bears is poisonous!
Bulin started the trip downhill
And reached the Lama temple made of manure.
He stood stock still, ready to be robbed of his secret
At knifepoint.
But it didn't work out that way. He could only
Sob his heart out
And lash thin copper cables around his stockings
To escape into the deep marshes.

There
Slippers clamored in a frenzy
And turned into a cluster of frogs.

(translated by Eva Hung)

_______________________

ARK
—Gu Cheng

The ship you've boarded
is doomed to go under—
vanish into the breathing sea.

But you will still have time to stare at the flag,
or at the dark, unfolding plain,
or at the white birds twittering
over their watery grave.

You still have time to lean on the rail,
puzzled by a sound in the passageway—
though the whole ship is empty,
though every door is ajar—

till cool flames float up
from every cabin.

(translated by Donald Finkel)

_______________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry, photos and art, and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com 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.)

May Your Mind Be Reviewed, Renewed

SEEDTIME
—Denise Levertov

There are weeds that flower forth in fall
in a gray cloud of seed that seems
from a not so great distance
plumblossom, pearblossom,
or first snow,

as if in a fog of feather-light
goosedown-silvery seed-thoughts
a rusty mind in its autumn
reviewed, renewed
its winged power.

_______________________

Strap on the boots:

Sunday (12/3) to Friday (12/8) is Molly Fisk’s next Poetry Boot Camp! If you don't know about Poetry Boot Camp, here's the place to find out:
http://www.poetrybootcamp.com, where you can also see the dates for 2007. Molly writes: Poetry Boot Camp is a bunch of fun and real work: writing six poems in six days, and critiquing six poems, too, in community with fellow poets. It's a great gift to give a poet-friend, or to ask for in your own stocking. Speaking of stockings, you can participate in Boot Camp wearing nothing but stockings, because it's all done via e-mail. So it's great when you want to get some serious writing done and forego the schmooze-factor of in-person writers' conferences. (Not that schmoozing isn't fun when you're in the mood!)


This weekend:

•••Saturday (11/25), 7-9 PM: "The Show" Poetry Series features Divine, Talaam Acey, Chas Jackson, and LSB at Wo'se Community Center, 2863 35th St. (Off Broadway), Sac. $5. Info: T.Mo at 916-455-POET.

•••And don't forget that the Monday night Sacramento Poetry Center reading has been moved to Tuesday next week! Members of The Great American Pinup web journal (greatamericanpinup.blogspot.com) will be reading at The Sacramento Poetry Center on TUESDAY, Nov. 28 at 7:30 PM, HQ for the Arts, 1719 25th St., Sacramento. Live (!) members reading will include David Koehn, Shawn Pittard, Victor Schnickelfritz, and Geraldine Kim (winner of the 2005 Fence Books Award). Plus recordings of Matthew Schmeer [Kansas City] and Richard Jeffrey Newman [New York].

_______________________

STEMS
—Denise Levertov
(after Jules Supervielle)

A poplar tree under the stars,
what can it do.
And the bird in the poplar tree
dreaming, his head
tucked into
far-and-near exile under his wing—
what can either of them
in their confused alliance of
leaves and feathers
do to avert destiny?

Silence and the
ring of forgetting
protect them until the moment when
the sun rises
and the memory with it.
Then the bird
breaks with his beak the thread
of dream within him,
and the tree unrolls
the shadow that will guard it
throughout the day.

______________________

THE WILLOWS OF MASSACHUSETTS
—Denise Levertov

Animal willows of November
in pelt of gold enduring when all else
has let go all ornament
and stands naked in the cold.
Cold shine of sun on swamp water,
cold caress of slant beam on bough,
gray light on brown bark.
Willows—last to relinquish a leaf,
curious, patient, lion-headed, tense
with energy, watching
the serene cold through a curtain
of tarnished strands.

_______________________

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry, photos and art, and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com 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.)

An Embarrassment of Riches

Like most people, I have 'way too much to be thankful for. But near the top of the list is the ever-widening circle of poets who keep the whole Snake enterprise going. Judy Taylor Graham is one of our staunchest supporters; recently I heard her read these two poems, and insisted she send them to Medusa:

HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS
—Taylor Graham, Somerset

Thanksgiving Eve at Motel 6,
a day from home, five hundred miles
of brake-lights, everybody trying
to gather back together into family.
Most of what I know of family
is with me in these one-night
rented walls.

Bedtime, time to walk the dog.
Behind the dumpster she wags her tail,
smiles, and here’s a man’s
face, by reflected light. I can’t tell,
he might be somebody’s old
high school teacher, squatting
beside the cardboard box
where he’ll be spending the night.
His breath haloes in the cold.

I don’t know him.
My dog licks him in the face
as if she did.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving.
A laden table, warmth between the walls.
People who greet me by name.

_______________________

THANKSGIVING MORNING
—Taylor Graham, Somerset
(for Roxy)

The wheels rolled you under, turned you back up
out of loam, out of cut grain and stubble,
so your eyes startled wide with the fright of day-
light, way past pain. You should have been dead
on that day of harvest. Surely it killed you.

But this is the day after. I’m using first-light
for mending, such scant daylight when it isn’t easy
to thread a needle. But mending is a way
to give thanks for time: regaining what used to be
ours, the things we’ve torn and used up, finished off,
not thought of. The doors that no longer open
because we slammed them too hard shut,
and simply boarded them up instead of pulling nails
and hinges, putting them back together
right. Where have we left the imprint of our fingers,
the dusting of our breath on a good day’s work?

Last night a surgeon stitched you back
to your life, and not for love of you,
but knowing his tools, how they take and
give back, how they implant and cut.

All night I dreamed how we’ve taken things apart
to parts, none so beautiful as the whole,
seen in a slanting, sharpened blade of light.

_______________________

Thanks, TG, for the TG poems on TG! "Home for the Holidays" just appeared on Centrifugal Eye; "Thanksgiving Day" appeared in The MacGuffin and is also in TG's Lies of the Visible. Head up to Hidden Passage Books in Placerville next Thursday, Nov. 30 at 7 PM to hear TG read from her award-winning chapbook, The Downstairs Dance Floor. That's 352 Main St., Placerville; stay for the refreshments and meet'n'greet.

And Happy Thanksgiving to the rest of you!

—Medusa

Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their poetry, photos and art, and announcements of Northern California poetry events to kathykieth@hotmail.com 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.)