Monday, April 09, 2007

Good Things Gooder and Other Terrors

16 papers to grade TONIGHT... so why am I writing this?


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Two Wednesdays ago I got to read with Lesley Jenike at the Public Library, and her poems were fantastic. So many of them responsive, responsible (not to mention marvelously imaginative) responses to things -- movies, people, history -- very musical, very rich in detail and texture...

I'm at a point where I want to read new things at my readings, but... And I did, and...


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2 from Mary Ruefle:

1) "Pity the poor proofreader/ who thinks this darke body of clowds/was my life." -- from "Darke Body of Clowds"

2) "...cry out like a bird/then sob like a human." -- from "I Came Across the Living One Night"


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Pterodactyl, Inc: one failure of nerve after another? -- to commit, to risk, to distinguish oneself from others as a way to remind oneself (and others) just how fundamentally similar we all are...


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A friend emails to ask what I think about prayer. I wonder why anyone would ask me this...

But I tell him: Read Fear and Trembling, as "no poet can reach Abraham."



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My new manuscript: SIMPLY ROCKET! There, I said it.



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Sebastian Matthews was here from Wednesday to Saturday. Brilliant man, brilliant light. Kind to spiders and skyscrapers alike. On Thursday night we sat around listening to (among other things) Clark Terry's In Orbit (the only Riverside album where Thelonious Monk was a sideman -- I highly recommend it) and reading new poems. You will be in the clouds when you hear/read his, esp. the one called "Skywalker."



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Chrome-hammer-black, like you told me.

2 comments:

Lester Shue said...

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did you read ruefle'new book?

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new chapbook: More Frisk Than Risk

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I bought s.y.'s EVOL.

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TONIGHT: BAD BRAINS (almost typed bad brians)

Matt said...

Lester,

1) I did read the new Ruefle and liked it very much. More to come on that...

2) Is your chap out somewhere?

3) Sadly, I haven't heard EVOL in ages. My last copy was on cassette, circa 1987. Lung Leg. Lung Leg.

4) Bad Brains? Are they touring again, or are you just re-listening? Did you see American Hardcore?

Yrs,

Mad Cow.