When You Turn into an Animal You Make Animal Noises Press

I knotted my hair into a snowball. I ripped a leg from the elk & used it as a crutch. The clanking sound was not its heart, which whistled in my sizzling platter. The pool bobbed with the thrown-out faces of men. Men & women pounded at the foggy window but the windows were locked so I turned up the Bach. My ribs are tuning forks, unaligned with any song.

Thanksgiving is over.

There, I said it.

***

I'm reading Everybody's Autonomy by Juliana Spahr. I'm on page 14 so I have a ways to go. What I would really appreciate is if you, in the comment box, let me know which theory or philosophy book was the most transformative for you. What has most deeply impacted your way of thinking/writing? I will then read it.

Whoever recommends the book that then impacts me the most will receive a prize greater than or equal to one pound of elk meat. Ok, greater.

Juliana Spahr looks like this:
I couldn't find a big cover of her book so her face will have to do.

It Wasn't the Nixon Mask that Got You the Job Press

I had brownies for breakfast. Then, to balance out the sweetness, I ate Cape Cod potato chips for lunch. I'm going to feel really gross by the time I get back to NY.

How's your Thanksgiving?

We deep fried Twinkies and two turkeys. Smartly, we fried the Twinkies first so that they wouldn't taste like meat.

Pictures to come.

***

In the last week, so many books have come out. Do you understand the seriousness of what I am saying? Do your jowls swing from side to side? Can you do a back handspring? I can't. Anyways, from the land of full-length books:

Heron/Girlfriend by Jen Tynes, from Coconut Books.

"Everything is hot when taken / out of the body and into town." If maps could have weather, I'd say: here's a map of that journey, from the body into town and back. If a map could have sound—regional dialect sung by a shape-shifter "real buddy-buddy with the multiple / inlets." The Bo Diddley epigraph sets the tone, but Heron/Girlfriend is a woman’s song. "Everyone looks / into my hollow and hollers / their own names. / I give holy hell / back in pieces." It's hot.
–Kate Greenstreet

The title is a warning: you are entering strange territory. True,
there are cars, highways, groceries, but a jacket "slips off/ a
shoulder in lieu/ of safety" and "animals/ stay on like the dark,/
drawing it." You won't regret being drawn into this fabric of short
lines and long imagination.
–Rosmarie Waldrop
***

Flying Guillotine just released Brett Price's chapbook, The Trouble with Mapping. It's in a run of 74 and each cover is different. One of the 74 covers might look like this:

***

Sam Starkweather's second chapbook is out from Rope-a-Dope Press. I saw it last week and somehow let the beauty slip away since I left the reading without buying a copy. SO, get out your checkbooks with me and order one.

Autobiography of a Six Year Old Press

I found The Selected Poems of Federico Garcia Lorca in my brother's room. Here are some great poems:

Fable

Unicorns and cyclopes.

Horns of gold
and eyes of green.

Over the steep,
in giant confusion,
they illustrate the unglazed
mercury of the sea.

Unicorns and cyclopses.

An eyeball
and a power.

Who doubts the terrible
efficacy of those horns?

Nature!
Conceal your targets!


This selected book has a number of the poems that Spicer 'translated' and all of their pages are folded down, so I can see that at some point I went back to the originals, since I used to speak Spanish, and compared them myself. Actually, I'm pretty sure I wrote an essay about Spicer's translations/alterations. Must have been my freshman year in college. I have to say, the translations in this collection are sort of without heart. How can you take the heart out of lorca and call it lorca? Shame on Merwin. Shame on William Jay Smith. Lackluster. They simplified his syntax. Both Spcier and Lorca are doing somersaults in their graves.

This translation isn't so bad:

Suicide
(Perhaps because he did not know his geometry)

At ten one morning
the youth forgot.

His heart was growing full
of broken wings and artificial flowers.

He noted his mouth
but one small word left.

When he removed his gloves, a fine
thin asge fell from his hands.

From the balcony he saw a tower.
he felt himself both balcony and tower.

Of course he saw how in its frame
the stopped clock observed him.

He saw his shadow stretched out still
upon theilken white divan.

And the boy, rigid, geometric,
broke the mirror with an ax.

When it broke, one huge stream of shadow
flooded his chimeric chamber.

****
As mentioned yesterday, my task coming home is to go through all my childhood stuff so my parents can move to mexico in ten days. So, I found the autiobiography I wrote when I was six. Actually, I think I spoke it out loud and a 5th grader wrote it down for me. We had older buddies in elementary school who once a week or maybe once a month would do some activity with us.

Anyways, it is called: Julia Alexandra Berman Cohen*

My name is Julia Alexandra Berman Cohen and I am six and a half years old. I was born in a hospital and I was a happy baby. I have always lived in the same house in Lincoln.

I am tall. I have light brown hair that is straight at the top and curly at the bottom. I have lost six teeth and I am getting my permanent ones now.

My mom's name is Diane and she is a talking doctor. Mom is making a new kitchen that is going to be different. We will have new tile in our new kitchen. It is going to be brown.

My dad is named Don. he is an architect. I have a brother called** Adam. He just turned 3.

I have a favorite doll, Clemenita. Her real name is Clementine, but I call her Clemenita. I got her when Adam was born. I lost*** my first Clemenita, so she was replaced. She's a baby with a white night gown with rattles on it.

I also like to play with Kristen, my next favorite doll. She is old-fashioned, and on her birthday, June 30th, she wears a velvet dress.

I like to color in coloring books and to draw. It's especially fun when Adam's napping****.

I do like to look at books my mom gets from the library.

I do like it when it's Christmas. I got a new bike. The wheels look like bubble gum*****. It's purple and pink. All my Christmas toys were purple and pink.

My favorite food is Pu-Pu Platter. it has a fire in the middle to roast your food. I order it when I go to a Chinese restaurant.

But most of all I like going to school and having a nice teacher. Her name is Mrs. DeBoalt and she;s just really nice. I have a special friend named Emily Kumbler. She's in fourth grade and she rides in my carpool.

* Yes, I was a little feminist and I didn't see why I just had my dad's last name so I went by my mom's last name, too, to be fair. I eventually stopped because 1) it was too hard to fit it all in on the standardized bubble tests you get all the time in school and 2) having two Jewish last names also feels a little weird when you're an atheist.
** I'm not sure why everyone else has a name and my brother is just "called" something.
***That doll was not actually lost. It was stolen by an insane cab driver and there was lots of drama involved.
****It was.
*****I only liked pink and purple for a long time. Let's not make fun of me. This was the last year I believed in Santa. I still don't quite understand why we celebrate Xmas, but I never question presents.

You Can Rest Your Child on the Ass of a Duck Press

My bff made this music video. My heart swells like a bee-sting with happiness that he exists and he makes things like this. O'Death, "Lowtide":


I'm in MA right now, in my parents house maybe for the last time. They move to Mexico in about 10 days. I have 20 boxes of 'things' in the attic but I went through a closet and found a memory box with letters to and from the toothfairy my parents had saved. Also, teeth. Is that gross? If you want to understand a fundamental difference between me and my brother, you can compair our first letters to the toothfairy:

My note, 1986, I was 5 (written on very small paper):

Dear Toothfairy
Do you have some teeth?
I want to see you when
I am awake
Please don't be afraid
because I won't hurt you
Dear toothfairy
I love you
What is your name?
Love Julia
P.S. I can write
from 1 to 10
Goodnight
I am in RI and my
tooth is here too


My brother's note, 1990, when he was 5 (written in giant letters on a huge piece of paper):

Dear tooth-
fairy would
you giv me money?
Adam Cohen

***

No joke. more tooth fairy letters tomorrow. Also, I love my brother and I can't wait to see him on Tuesday. Also, I can't figure how to upload book covers onto this computer so I have all these poetry books I want to tell you about but it will have to wait.

I Had Peanuts for Breakfast Yesterday & I Still Feel Gross Press

I'm joining a gym with M. We have a 3 day trial pass so we haven't paid for anything yet. I sort of felt bad for the young woman who gave us a tour. She tried to sell us on the perks: the two free tanning sessions (no thanks) and free child care (what child). We looked blankly at her when she mentioned tanning and then after the child care thing didn't go over, she said, "Well, if you're ever babysitting and you want to come to the gym, you can take the kid with you."

Yeah, if I'm the worst babysitter ever:

Mom: Honey, what did you do with the babysitter today?

Kid: Well, she took me to the gym with her boyfriend. And I sat in an emptied out closet with the dirty laundry while they used the StairMaster. Can she babysit me again next week?

***

But I'm legitimately excited to exercise. I've forgotten how. They have spinning classes. I think that means you pedal really fast on a stationary bike in a room full of women, listening to pop music. I'm PUMPED.

***
A new issue (#9) of Pax Americana is up. Love it, leave it, and then take it back into your heart.

***

Do you like cake? I can't go to this on Thursday but I wish I could. Can you?

You are cordially invited:
Thursday, November 20th, 2008
7pm - 9pm
readings beginning promptly at 7:30pm

Celebrate 15 Years of
Four Way Books
with:
C. S. Carrier, Eileen Pollack, Kevin Prufer,
Daniel Tobin & Alissa Valles

and forthcoming authors:
Priscilla Becker & Farrah Field

Cake and Wine Reception
Book Signings to follow the readings

McNally Jackson Books
52 Prince Street, NYC
for detailed directions please visit hopstop.com
RSVP: 212-334-5430 or editors@fourwaybooks.com

Free StairMasters for all!

Giraffe Roof Press

I don't really understand this scultpure but I like it. Is it a sculpture of a Mario-like man trying to do the bunny hop?

The tallest man I know (and I think I know a bunch of tall guys) is buying a Mini Cooper. Navy. I'm going to make a short video of him getting in the car. I need some evidence that it's possible. I keep asking him if he's having the roof designed extra tall and he equivocates by saying "giraffe roof" or "sun roof," which are, to my knowledge, not legitimate options.



***

My brother works in Atlanta. I'm still not entirely sure I know what he does, but I do know I couldn't do it myself. His company is the kind of company that sponsors all-day trips to the woods to bond. The kind of company that has good 'perks.' The kind of company where there is one-upmanship for attractive looking ties. Anyways, it is, apparently, also the kind of company that has a donut eating contest. Somehow my brother got nominated to eat the donuts for his team in the competitive game of How Many Donuts Can You Eat in 4 Minutes?

This is our email correspondence after it happened:

Brother: I JUST ATE 14 DONUTS IN 4 MINUTES. I WON!

Me: I just told my office-mate and she said "He just won my respect, sort of." HOW DO YOU FEEL?

Brother: Like death. The runner up and I spent the next 20 minutes chugging water and trying to purge in the bathroom, but were unsuccessful. I went through a shaking-sweating stage… now I’m cold.

Me: Ew. Sorry. What kind of donuts? Please tell me you won something?

brother: Krispy Creme

Me: omg.

Postscript: I still don't know if he won anything. But I did find out what people in his company were doing later that same day: Someone at his work organized a night out that involved a Disco Bus and bar hopping. What is a disco bus, you ask? Well, I think it is a refurbished school bus, with dancing poles, a disco ball, loud music, and a keg. And the bus drives you to one bar and then another and you drink in between, under the reflections of the disco ball.

I'm too old to even imagine how that is fun. So I just emailed him, "Are there photos on facebook?" and I've yet to hear back.

***

Enough family updates.

***
You know, I have a really long list of books I want to read, but this just released and hopefully in the next year, I'll have time. If you buy it first, can I buy the used copy off of you?: The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle & Ralph Waldo Emerson 1834-1872 (Volume I) is now available on Amazon for 9.99.

***

Tonight I'm going to this reading at KGB:
Monday, November 17, Brenda Shaughnessy & John Yau

***

Tuesday seems quite.

***

This is happening on Wednesday:

2nd Draft Reading Series
Readers: Timothy Donnelly, Thomas Hummel, Sommer Browning, and Nancy Kuhl
Wednesday, November 19, 7:30 pm
Roots & Vine Café -- 409 Grand St. at Clinton St.

***
And then Thursday is the 4 Faced Liar Reading I mentioned last week.

Like a Pulsing, Scaly Creature Wrapped Around Your Heart Press

Guess what I found on my way to the subway/work yesterday.

A bag of cocaine.

Yes, a dime bag of cocaine, a block from my home. I live in neighborhood with lots of kids running around. I didn't want to leave it in the middle of the sidewalk for a kid to find, and I also didn't want to touch it, really, like anything else on the ground. So I nudged it with my foot all the way to a tree and buried it so no children or crack heads would digest it.

So, that was my good Samaritan act of the day.

I love Brooklyn.

***

Today I had lunch at Eisenberg's Sandwich Shop. It's sort of a Jewish deli right by where I work, but well-known enough to have tourists come, I think. People like the Matzoh ball soup and the tuna sandwiches. It might be the worst, unexpected dining experience I've had in years. Anyways, I was grossed out:

1) There were big, black flies

2) There were little fruit flies

3) I don't like a variety of flies crawling on and nesting in my food.

4) The waitress completely ignored us for an inappropriately long amount of time even though the restaurant was not that crowded, and even though I deliberately made eye contact with her multiple times.

5) The waitress brought out one of the meals a good 10 minutes after everyone else was served (and I don't think a grilled cheese sandwich takes so long to make).

6) This isn't the restaurant's fault but: A group of 5 men sat down next to us, professional looking men, and then each of them seemed to pick one of us (5 women) to stare at through our entire meals. Intensely stared at with occasional little smiles. I wanted to tell them to F off, but a) I didn't think that would get me anywhere besides being called a feminazi and b) they were actually seated so close to us it would have been very awkward to finish our meals after I told them that their stares were less than appreciated.

7) One of my most well behaved co-workers, the one who always dresses and acts professionally, lost control at the end of the meal, and before she could stop herself, said:

I FEEL GROSS.

***

Oh wait, did you want to hear about poetry?

You should really buy this broadside by Elisa Gabbert:

Designed and sold by Grey Cat.


And next Thursday you should come to this reading 'curated' by Shafer Hall:

Hey Fishes, it's been too long, so we're gonna raise a very special poetry ruckus in the back room of the Four-Faced Liar.

Chris Tonelli is coming all the way up from Carolina, Sampson Starkweather is making a rare departure from his makeshift laboratory deep in the North woods, and Justin Marks is getting out of bed to come celebrate their synchronous publications by Rope-a-Dope press.

Rope-a-Dope Press is a collective of former pugilists in South Boston who create fantastic handmade chapbooks, broadsides, and other collaborations between visual artists and poets.

So come meet us at 6:30 PM in the dank dungeon of the Famous Face, 165 W. 4th St. and 6th Ave., on Thursday November 20th. This isn't one to miss.

Love,
Shafer


Justin Marks' first full length collection, A Million in Prizes, is forthcoming from New Issues Press in spring 2009. His chapbooks include Voir Dire (Rope-a-Dope Press, forthcoming) and [Summer insular] (Horse Less Press, 2007). He is the founder and Editor of Kitchen Press Chapbooks and lives in New York City.

Sampson Starkweather is the author of City of Moths, forthcoming from Rope-A-Dope Press, and The Photograph from horse less press. He lives in the woods.

Chris Tonelli is the author of three chapbooks: For People Who Like Gravity and Other People (Rope-A-Dope Press, forthcoming), A Mule-Shaped Cloud (w/ Sarah Bartlett, horse less press, 2008), and WIDE TREE: Short Poems (Kitchen Press, 2006). He teaches at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, NC.

Founded in the spring of 2007 by painter Robert daVies and poet Mary Walker Graham, Rope-a-Dope Press fosters collaborations between artists, writers, and their communities through the publication of handmade, letterpress printed chapbooks, broadsides, and artists' books.

***

Freud vs His Father Press

Check out the new journal and first issue of Sir! edited by Brian Foley.

You can find my poem behind the white bald man's head four rows down all the way to the left. I never thought I would say that.

Contenders in Sir!:
Chad Reynolds, Noah Falck, Blake Butler, Scott Garson, Mike Young, Juliet Cook, Brooklyn Copeland, Rauan Klassnik, Peter Berghoef, Elisa Gabbert, Ryan Walsh, Carl Annarummo, Peter Schwartz, Zachary Schomburg & Emily Kendall Frey, Sean Kilpatrick, Julia Cohen, Charles Lennox, Shane Jones,Spencer Troxell, Brandon Hobson, Nicolle Elizabeth, Nathan Logan, and William Walsh.

***

On the subway I am reading two books. I'm digging Kristeva's Revolt, She Said, which is interview format

The interview focuses on the 68 revolt in France, Kristeva's initial intrigue with psychoanalysis, her growing affinity and then professional practice of psychoanalysis, her ideas of feminism, etc etc, and concepts of art creation and production. So far. I'm only on page 30.

Because it's 8am when I'm reading it, by 8:30am I get sleepy and switch to this:
Stick Out Your Tongue by Ma Jian, translated by Flora Drew

My favorite lines so far:
"The old man seemed nervous now; he looked me straight in the eye. The yak blood has congealed. I scraped it out, passed him the empty hat, and the took out my knife, sliced the blood in half and handed him a piece. He took it from me without looking, then with trembling hands scooped it into his mouth"

This collection of fiction was published in China in 1987 and a ban on all of Jian's future work was put into effect because Stick Out Your Tongue portrayed the devastation or ways of subsistence that didn't show Tibet to be the thriving counterpart to China. The government accused Jian of failing "to depict the great strides the Tibetan people have made in building a united, prosperous and civilized Socialist Tibet."

Beautiful Trophy Press

For the last year or so I've been getting what I thought was spam from Orbit.com.

Today I decided that the spam was annoying me so I clicked on it to find out how to unsubscribe.

What I learned by actually reading the subject heading properly is that it wasn't Orbit.com but actually Obit.com and it's a newsletter about Obituaries and fiction/non-fiction about Death. See the description:

What defines an important life? Obit Magazine provides coverage on how the loss of a person, a place, an object or an idea presents an opportunity for examination and discussion. Obit is a forum for ideas and opinions about life, death, and transition with a voice that is truly unique. You are welcome to link directly to this article and share it with as many people that you wish. Please register and leave a comment. We are interested in your point of view and would like to share it with our readers.

I unsubscribed.

***




***

This might actually be the lamest poetry/blog scam I've heard of. For $200 dollars you can "win" a beautiful trophy. Come & get it:

Got a minute? If so, we would like to tell you about the Chapeau Blog Awards.

We believe the art of blogging is truly ground-breaking and without a doubt bloggers, like you, have changed the way information is disseminated.

Your contribution is why we designed the Chapeau Blog Awards. We think it's time to start rewarding accomplished bloggers, much like other award programs award the best in website content and design.

We invite you to visit us at www.ChapeauBlogAwards.Com to find out more information about our charter.

If you don't want to receive further communications from the Chapeau Blog Awards, please reply to this email and let us know.

If you do, please look for further communications about our Call for Entries and early bird pricing that extends through November.

Those who win will receive the following:
- Recognition as one of the most brilliant blogs in the world
- A beautiful award trophy
- Tools to promote their win including:
-- Sample press release
-- Logos & Site Awards Buttons
- Chapeau Blog Awards online Gala tickets

Please let us know if you have any questions about the Chapeau Blog Awards.

Sincerely,
The Chapeau Blog Awards

P.S. Be sure to check back as we start reviewing blog sites to
highlight blogging best practices.
Reply

Diet 7 Up & Mini Muffins Press

The items consisting of this press name are the only items that were given to us to consume at an office party.

Sigh.

I lost my phone about a month ago so I'm sorry if you've been trying to reach me. I have no phone. This makes my brother sad because lack of communication with younger sibling = me a bad older sister. He wrote me a haiku about it:

Lost phone, but no cares.
Why worry? You have no friends.
Please call your brother.

Cutting, yet also imploring. Very persuasive.

***
Things in my hood. I'm trying to persuade you to come out to Sunset Park:










What's up?

Well, if you're looking for a new place to send your work:

Dear Friends,

I have joined forces with a few people to start an on-line literary journal. Our ideal launch date is January, 2009.

The journal is called Scapegoat and the URL is www.scapegoatreview.com. Please keep in mind that the journal is not up and running yet - if you go to the URL, you will see only an outline of what it will look like.

We are currently seeking submissions for all genres - poetry, fiction and non fiction (word limit for fiction and non fiction is 500 words).

If you are interested in submitting, please do so on the submission form found on our website. Feel free to email the site or me directly with any questions you might have.

Thanks, and I look forward to reading your work!

Best,
Kate Hall

***
Tonight you could:

Tuesday, November 11, 7:00pm
A TRIBUTE TO JANE COOPER
with Kazim Ali, Jill Bialosky, Celia Bland, Martha Collins, Eva Kollisch, Beatrix Gates, Marie Howe, Jan Heller Levi, Thomas Lux & Jean Valentine

Poets and colleagues honor the late Jane Cooper (1924-2007), an award-winning poet and beloved mentor. Co-sponsored by The New School.

Theresa Lang Center, Arnold Hall
The New School
55 West 13th Street, 2nd Floor
Admission free

Tomorrow:
Rosmarie Waldrop is reading at the Poetry Project Wednesday evening. You should go. Tell me about it afterwards. I'll be studying my sweet sweet vocab cards.

And this is happening on Saturday:

Experiments & Disorders: New Poetic Forms
featuring Anne Carson and Robert Currie, and Legends
Saturday, 15 November, 7pm, $10

Dixon Place
#161 Chrystie Street
btw. Rivington & Delancey
http://dixonplace.org
To purchase tickets:
http://tinyurl.com/5fs5zm


***
Remember when I ripped your heart out? You can now buy it back for $5 in the form of two new horse less press chapbooks:

Shadows are Weather by Allison Carter

2008, 48 pages.
"a wild look, a bag of groceries, the yarn spun"
8.5x5.5, staple-bound.
cover art by Conan Kelly.

Poem:

still sweeping as if on wheels
then the left splinters
is the dust falling off my own body or is it coming from the skin of people who visit

and what web

looking behind

walking ahead of the conversation as if it was a tail

all eyes

holding out a hand in the empty room
walking ahead of the conversation as if it was a tail
looking behind all eyes


Toward Eadward Forward by Emily Abendroth

c 2008, 44 pages.
"The Sowgirl doesn't speak often but when she does she is a real flinger of zingers."
8.5x5.5, staple-bound.
cover art by Emily Abendroth.

THE TROT & THE RACK

the supple extension of calf and femur shafts
are sapwoods of mobility, demure typhoons
whose gullyside cogitations sully the pull
toward pure rapidity via skittish dervishes

a grazing to taste, a fawnskin cushioned blaze
of distracted antics, proceeding by taproot and halfshoot
as if cotyledons were synonymous with tingling
hamstrings and a coy polyp one whose haunts
might feasibly deter the gauntlet of standardization calls

swallowing instead an upturned pebbles gut
laughter composed of its newly exposed spoils
that this could buoy
simply by proving the undergrowth there
in curious posture, listing, but short of destitute
its roundabout crouch and exacerbated wares

to which you bent so low, sucking your cheek fat
tight plunging the face right into the cool sauce
of water cabling a northward eye in resolute pursuit
of contained heaving, of soft bloated amphibious
flesh baubles, of a toggling velvet expiration

and no frogs were disturbed in the looking
of that delicious underbelly
for once you didn't fumble for purchase, driven
instead by an inner rumble for near viewing
as if vision could saunter, pupate
populate by similar orders of glutted smallness

I Think It's Unprofessional to Wear a Giant Sweater That Ends Right Below Your Tush & Black Tights & High Heels To Work & I Wish It Would Stop Press

If you subtract all of the office work I did today, which was in fact very productive, (and I hope many of my academic authors will be very appreciative of my thorough responses to their emails,) this is what I'm left with when I account for the rest of my time:

1) at about 9:45 am

Obama dances on Ellen:

I'm going to be honest, I think this is very cute.

2) at about 11am:

Twiggy Twiggy:


3) at about 2pm:

Kiiiiiii:


4) at about 4pm:

Listented to Stars of the Lid on myspace.


5) at about 4:45pm I started reading the new issue of Gently Read Literature to hear what Chris Glomski has to say about Noah Eli Gordon's poetry. (Which I disagree with in a number of places, but to each her own.) And what Michael Wahlgren has to say about Karen Volkman's Nomina.


6) took a moment to contemplate how people dress inappropriately at work.

also 7) two blog posts in one day!

Hand-Me-Down Forget-Me-Not Press

Good
I tried not to get my hopes up about this election because I was so disappointed when Kerry lost. I'm genuinely relieved. Obama! That man is going to age so quickly. All of the newspapers were sold out besides the Chinese and Spanish ones in my neighborhood so my parents are graciously sending me their copies of The New York Times and The Boston Globe so that I can keep them. Like a dork.

Hypocritically f*cked
Citizens of California voted to pass Proposition 2, which allows animals raised for slaugher to have more space in their cages and crates. Because they respect and care so much about the mental and physical well being of the animals they eat. In related news, Citizens of California voted in favor of Proposition 8, which eliminates the newly-declared right of same-sex couples to marry. Because the rights of humans who are not raised for slaughter to be eaten by other humans, but who embrace the lifestyle they choose and request equal legal benefits, are not respected. It makes my head explode and my heart hurt.

***

I just started re-reading Claudia Rankine's Don't Let Me Be Lonely.

Man, if you haven't read this in 2 years, you should. It's time. Then talk to me about it, ok?

***

There are warring readings this Friday:

1) Earshot!

For one last time, find us at The Lucky Cat, located in Williamsburg, Brooklyn!
Friday, November 7 @ 8 PM
$5 + 1 free drink

Featuring:
Monica De La Torre (*Public Domain*, *Talk Shows*)
Sueyeun Juliette Lee (*That Gorgeous Feeling*)
Farah Ghniem (New York University)
Paige Taggart (The New School)
Tom Treanor (Columbia University)

Hosted by Nicole Steinberg

The Lucky Cat is located at 245 Grand Street in Brooklyn, between Driggs and Roebling. Visit their website for directions: http://www.theluckycat.com.


2)Single Poetry Reading Series, 8, Seeking Stable Attractive Poetry,
18-99, for Linguistic Recreation. Must be well-crafted, delight in obscure forms and enjoy windsurfing.

This Friday, November 7th, You Have A Date!
Take a Long Walk on the Beach With

Tim Peterson
Adam Tobin
David Carillo
& Kate Broad!

Tim Peterson lives in Brooklyn and writes poetry, all the while seeking out other complexly gendered individuals for companionship and connection, hungry for articulations of reading and being read as voiced experiences hunting you like a bluejay. SINCE I MOVED IN (Gil Ott Award, Chax Press) was published in 2007. Tim edits EOAGH: A Journal of the Arts.

Adam Tobin owns and operates Unnameable Books, a new and used bookstore in central Brooklyn. He is author of Ode to Pumpsie Green & Stretch Phillips (horse less press, 2005) and editor of The Weekly Weakling (forthcoming), a series of occasional letterpress pamphlets. You may have seen his older work in EOAGH or Fence or other
publications, but he hasn't really written much since he opened the bookstore. He promises, however, to read at this reading at least one poem you've never seen before.

David Carillo lives in West Hartford with his wife and dog. He is working on his MFA in Creative Nonfiction at the University of Pittsburgh and teaches English at the University of Connecticut at Waterbury. He has poems forthcoming in nanomajority.com.

Kate Broad has lived in India and Brazil and currently resides in Brooklyn, where she is a doctoral student in English at the City University of New York Graduate Center. She has poems in Freshwater, The Wellesley Review, and forthcoming in Karamu, and has won several writing awards, including one from the Academy of American Poets. Kate
is working on her first full-length manuscript, Hard to Swallow.


Only at Pete's Candy Store
709 Lorimer Street, Williamsburg, Brooklyn
(718) 302-3770
"L" to Lorimer, "G" to Metropolitan.


***
Next week this is going on:
Tuesday, November 11, 7:00pm

A Tribute to Jane Cooper with Kazim Ali, Jill Bialosky, Celia Bland, Martha Collins, Eva Kollisch, Beatrix Gates, Marie Howe, Jan Heller Levi, Thomas Lux & Jean Valentine.

Poets and colleagues honor the late Jane Cooper (1924-2007), an award-winning poet and beloved mentor. Cooper was the official New York State Poet from 1995 to 1997, and she taught at Sarah Lawrence College for nearly 40 years. Co-sponsored by The New School.

Theresa Lang Center, Arnold Hall
The New School, 55 West 13th Street, 2nd Floor
Admission free.

Cheap & Thick Like Love Press

You voted, right?

Right?

I like to dress up as a Druid when I vote, all serious-like:

I voted at 7am and my district's solitary booth was already broken. But maybe they fixed it by now. It felt good to vote (by hand, with vote going in cardboard box), for whatever that's worth. I'm wary of putting things in boxes and expecting something to come of it, but at least the vote is there for the counting.


***
My friend recently started a blog I think you might like: Please Go Easy On Me. Lots of video splicing/ montage. Maybe you should check it every day during your lunch break.

***
You should buy Warsaw Bikini because, well, it looks awesome:

Warsaw Bikini
Sandra Simonds

January 2009
Trade Paper Original
ISBN: 978-0-615-25623-8
80 pp. | $15.00
Bloof Books

Praise for Warsaw Bikini:

In Sandra Simonds’ poetry, a terrific, nihilistic dislike of herself and others (her heroine “dires” men) vies with an extreme will to prevail in full color. The tension is sustained by an imagination of remarkable fertility and a rich and crowded verbal palette. Simonds writes to sting. She’s like a Plath whose capacity for erotic altruism has thoroughly imploded, producing a crisis that only a brilliant talent could turn into a field of triumphantly exhibited power. Simonds has such a talent.
—Cal Bedient

For 100 years, maybe 3000, poetry has wanted to know what it is. Sandra Simonds shows it. Every outset projects a lack the sequence must undo, overturning postponement our wanting’s askance with preposterous now. Why these baubles on the brain? Food, fishes, Poland. I am small, she says, her happenstance clothing the essential. That wilderness holds together, discloses organum, who knew?
—R. M. Berry

Sandra Simonds’ poems are hyperactive conduits into the chaos of our lost-at-sea moment in time. She’s in love with words and all the damage they can do. La belle dame sans papiers—she’s witty, smart, a real troublemaker, playing the lyre of her twenty-first century blues.
—Barbara Hamby


***
Last Thursday I went to the Wave Book Political poetry reading and saw these folks read:

Azereen Van der Vliet Oloomi:
Eileen Myles:
Elizabeth Willis:
John Ashbery:

Thomas Sayer Ellis:
Nick Flynn
Mathias Svalina

Rachel Zucker:

Do you like the little old lady gray hair at the corner of all the photos. Who wants to teach me how to crop?

Azereen Van der Vliet Oloomi was the only poet I hadn't heard read before and I was impressed with her work & want to read more.

***
I'm going to this tonight:
Literary-Magazine Editors Introduce Emerging Writers at The New York Public Library

Program II
Tuesday, November 4th, 6 – 7:30 pm
DeWitt Wallace Periodical Room, The New York Public Library,
Humanities and Social Sciences Library at Fifth Avenue and 42nd
(Please use Fifth Avenue entrance; admittance is free)

Many Mountains Moving: A Literary Journal of Diverse Contemporary Voices
Editor Thaddeus Rutkowski introduces fiction writer Jon Swan.

Washington Square
Editor Levi Rubeck introduces poet Elisa Gabbert.

Bidoun
Editor Michael Vazquez introduces nonfiction writer Anand Balakrishnan.


***
This is happening on Thursday. I really want to go but I might also be having a drink with the lovely designer of Saltgrass. Either way, you should go:

Chin Music: The Pacific Standard Poetry Reading Series
Featuring Matthea Harvey, Amber West and Rachel Rothbart
Thursday, November 6th @ 7:00PM

Pacific Standard Bar
82 Fourth Avenue
Brooklyn, NY
(between St. Marks and Bergen Streets)

http://www.pacificstandardbrooklyn.com

Please join us for our next evening of Chin Music, the Pacific Standard Poetry Reading Series. On November 6th, we are happy to present three fine poets: Matthea Harvey, Amber West, and Rachel Rothbart. Other writers slated to appear this season include Yusef Komunyakaa, Matthea Harvey, Matthew Dickman, Gregory Pardlo, Idra Novey, Mytili Jagannathan, and Quraysh Ali Lansana. Series curated by Colin Cheney.

Please note our earlier reading time of 7:00PM.

Located on Fourth Avenue in Brooklyn, near the Atlantic/Pacific station, Pacific Standard is a literary bar serving up over a dozen West Coast microbrews on tap (as well as choice selections from small and local breweries), a fine collection of wines, and tasty cheeses and meats.

--

FEATURED READERS

Matthea Harvey is the author of MODERN LIFE (Graywolf 2007), SAD LITTLE BREATHING MACHINE (Graywolf, 2004), and PITY THE BATHTUB ITS FORCED EMBRACE OF THE HUMAN FORM (Alice James Books, 2000). Her first children's book, THE LITTLE GENERAL AND THE GIANT SNOWFLAKE, illustrated by Elizabeth Zechel, is forthcoming from Tin House Books. Matthea is a contributing editor to jubilat. She teaches poetry at Sarah Lawrence and lives in Brooklyn.

Amber West is a poet, playwright and teaching artist from California. Her poems have been published in Red Wheelbarrow, Yerm Ahm, and Chinquapin, and two of her plays have been performed by San Francisco theater companies. She recently completed her MFA in Creative Writing at NYU. Currently, she is a Jacob K. Javits Fellow at the University of Connecticut, and a literacy tutor at the Brooklyn Public Library.

Rachel Rothbart grew up on Eastern Long Island and is now a resident of New York City. She makes her living as a writer and editor, is a recent graduate of the MFA program at Sarah Lawrence College, and spends a fair amount of time wondering about whalesong, women who intrinsically know which way is north, and the lure of fine, wingtipped shoes. She has work forthcoming in Conduit and on FailBetter.com.

My living room:

Liquidation Press

The second issue of Fou is up. I'm smitten with Brad Soucy's design/artwork for the site. Poets featured in this issue:
Tony Aarts, Ana Božičević, Heather Christle, Adam Clay, Peter Davis, Denise Duhamel, Adam Fell, Emily Kendal Frey, Brian Henry, Brad Liening, Chris Martin, Clay Matthews, Corey Mesler, Danielle Pafunda, Matthew Savoca, Michael Schiavo, Brandon Shimoda, Mathias Svalina, Chad Sweeney, Bronwen Tate, Dara Wier, Joshua Marie Wilkinson.

I really like Chris Martin's poem from This False Peace, but the spacing is such that I cannot pilfer it so you'll have to go to the website and read it.

Denise Duhamel is up to something. Truly.

***

I'm going to the Jill Bialosky & D. Nurkse reading tonight at KGB.

D Nurkse is one of the few poets published in The New Yorker that is interesting, although his non-9/11 related poetry is much more intriguing than the (post)9/11 work for obvious reasons. Someone should really replace the poetry editor. I think Paul Muldoon (previously Alice Quinn) needs to "trust the audience" a bit more with his selections. But, like, for realz. Anyways, I do like Nurkse's poetry, regardless of the other people published in The New Yorker:


There Is No Time, She Writes
by D. Nurkse (The New Yorker, August 6, 2007)


We have to bomb the rebel cities

from a great height, find shelter

for the refugees, carry a sick kitten

to the shade of a blighted elm,

fall in love, walk by the breakwater,

learn the words to separate,

marry, see a lawyer, grow old,



and always the wind seethes

in the bladelike leaves,

always the ant under its burden,

proud and indomitable, she writes,

always the faint music, the touch

of the other’s hand, and no way

to return, or even turn,

no way to face ourselves:



writing this, I pressed so hard

she says, the words are embedded

in the grain of the desk

and it is dark but I sense you

listening, trying to frame an answer

there where the dark turns inward

and a small bell chimes

in the stupefying heat.


***

So, come to the reading with me.

***

Two notes from Phil Cordelli on his new ebook New Wave:

Dear friends,

I'm happy to pronounce that "New Wave", a project I've been tinkering
around with for a few years now, is finally seeing the light of day,
or at least the pale blue light of the computer monitor, as a free
ebook from Blazevox Books. You can download it at:

http://www.blazevox.org/ebook.htm

Merry reading,

Phil


Hello again all,

Rebecca convinced me that a little background info might be appropriate. "New Wave" is a rearrangement of a long poem by John Ashbery titled "A Wave". Each letter and mark of punctuation in the original poem has been retained and recycled. Also no animals were harmed during the writing of this poem, at least not by me. "A Wave" was a poem that I ran into when I was first starting to read poetry and it frustrated me to no end. It seemed to be fundamentally unintelligible, written in a kind of alien logic. I started the project around 2003 partly as a way to understand it and partly as a way to destroy it, divert its rush of words, or grind it down to something that I recognized. If you're interested, you can hear John Ashbery read from it on the Penn Sound website: http://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/Ashbery.html

***

Are you looking for an interesting poetry anthology for friends/relatives this lovely holiday season? Say, your pumpkin pie, um, sucks, and you should really come bearing something other than pumpkin pie. Well, buy & bring this:

The Poets Guide to Birds
Anhinga Press
Price: $22.00
Early orders—25% discount ($16.50 each)

Also, you should buy it because Joshua Poteat is in it and he is an awesome poet.

***

I like child vampires who question Biden's light sensitivity:

My Life Is Amazing, But How Are You? Press

”I look for individuals who are transidiomatic, who have a sense of vibrational affinities,”--Anthony Braxton

While I jump in the shower, you check out The Home Video Review of Books. Give it a a few secs to load.

Send us your books/chapbooks & The Home Video Review of Books will review your book via video. It's win-win.

Also, is this an inappropriate away message?:

"I'm going to gut a kangaroo, hollow it out, & then jump inside its lower body so I can hop over & visit you."