The Chatelaine's Poetics

FOR THE DISCERNING EARS!

Barry Schwabsky's top cds, first half of 2005:

M.I.A.--Arular
Antony and the Johnsons--I Am a Bird Now
The Concretes--layourbattleaxedown
Masha Qrella--Unsolved Remained

with honorable mention to Electrelane, Fursaxa, The Magic Numbers, Sam Prekop, (Smog), Sufjan Stevens, The White Stripes, etc.

*
best belated discovery from 2004:

The Organ--Grab That Gun

*
and the top reissues-- [Barry sez is] "music that (not to be melodramatic about it) reconciles me to being American":

Link Wary--Wray's Three Track Shack
Charlie Poole--You Ain't Talkin' to Me: Charlie Poole and the Roots of Country Music

IN KATRINA'S AFTERMATH...SOME POETRY

Like many, I'm sadly watching the aftermath of Katrina. On the Suny Poetics List, there was some talk about poets offering some books to help others rebuild their poetry libraries which may well have been damaged. So this spurred me to think ... and concoct this offer below -- the books will come not just from my Meritage Press stock but from prior donations by poets to a new project I'd just begun. I'm sure those generous poets -- some of whom donated as a result of reading about my project on this blog -- would support making those books available for not just my project but for this offer below. I sort of like the idea of giving out a box of 20 poetry books -- I have this image of a block resulting from that stack, as in the corner block for a new building except that this could be a block for someone else's new poetry library. Anyway, please feel free to forward:


TO THOSE AFFECTED BY KATRINA:

Our thoughts are with you in these difficult times. As you begin to recover from Katrina's aftermath, if you would like to either rebuild your poetry library -- or start one -- please feel free to let me know if you would be interested in a box of 20 poetry books. These are books donated by various contemporary poets, as well as from those titles published by Meritage Press.

This offer is not just open to poets but poetry lovers, and those who might now welcome poetry books into their post-Katrina lives.

Some of you may need time to figure out your new address; just know that this offer is open to you whenever you are ready to receive such a package (or I suppose available for as long as my supplies last). Email me at GalateaTen@aol.com if you wish to receive this attempt to let you know that we are wishing the best for you in Katrina's aftermath.

Sincerely,

Eileen Tabios
www.meritagepress.com

SERENDIPITY POETICS

Serendipity is as useful a muse as anything.

Belatedly, I've added a section of "double colons" to my manuscript that'll become my 2006 book, The Secret Lives of Punctuations, Vol. I. The process began when I read one of Barbara's poems which used two colons in between phrases. I initially thought she meant the punctuations to suggest the phrases can work backward and forward viz the colon-based relationship (if/then) -- which is to say, I posited a narrative relationship. She didn't, though appreciated my read, but had meant it in an equally interesting manner, to wit -- "a visual experience occurring with the double-colons, as if it means to give the reader space but also suffocate that space, in addition to their functioning to slow the pace down to a struggling crawl."

Sorta shades of Jose Garcia Villa with that attempt to use the punctuation to slow the pace of the poem (re his comma poems). Or P. Inman (with his period poems).

Of course this got me started thinking more about double colons (being so focused as I am at the moment on punctuations)...and then I happened just hours ago to FINALLY read A.R. Ammons' 1974-published long poem SPHERE: The Form of a Motion. His use of the colon is simply brilliant.

SPHERE is perfect form -- how the colon keeps the energy/momentum going so that the long poem never flags. To wit:

Perfect : : Form : : Perfect.

And so obviously how that circling back gets at the concept of a sphere. Again -- just a brilliant conception by Ammons.

And all that led to two poems that will comprise my double colon section in my Punctuations book! Colons that question which phrase generated which conclusion. Actually, this also touches on a long-held poetic interest of mine -- writing poems that can be read forward, backward, left to right or right to left...

Two poems, the first dedicated to Barbara and the second dedicated to Thomas Fink who'd suggested I check out Ammons' SPHERE.

Anyway, that whole process that led to my double-colon poems can be called serendipity. Or, to suggest again that when one is open to the world, the world rewards your attention with poems.


*****
UPDATE: A peep queried about an example of what I mean by poems "that can be read forward, backward, left to right or right to left..." There are examples in my book Reproductions of the Empty Flagpole, a collection of prose poems. Several of the prose poems are comprised of paragraphs that, were you to reorder them (including reading them backward as they're presented), might still work. This effect would make sense given that one of the influences to those prose poems is cubism...so that narratively, they're not linear anyway and the referential juxtapositions can seem arbitrary....

I'MA PAYING ATTENTION

and just coz I ain't leakin' out my brain to impress you "public" with my responses don't mean moi engagement with them (particularly the wines) weren't a deeeeep experience. So, moi latest "Relish" update on what I read as I imbibed or vice versa:

BOOKS & COLLECTIONS:
ANNE SEXTON: A Self-Portrait in Letters, edited by Linda Gray Sexton and Lois Ames

LOVE POEMS by Anne Sexton

SELECTED POEMS OF ANNE SEXTON, edited by Diane Wood Middlebrook and Diane Hume George

RED SKY CAFE, poems by Geoffrey O'Brien

GENTLE NOW, DON'T ADD TO HEARTACHE, poems by Juliana Spahr

BIRD AND FOREST, poems by Brett Cunningham

WHY WRITE?, prose by Paul Auster

THE PROMISE: How One Woman Made Good On Her Extraordinary Pact To Send A Classroom of First-Graders to College, memoir by Oral Lee Brown with Caille Millner

ALWAYS BEGINNING: Essays on a Life in Poetry by Maxine Kumin

HOUSE, nonfiction by Tracy Kidder

MY 'DAM LIFE, memoir by Sean Condon


WINES
2002 Domaine Le Flaive Puligny Montrachet Les Pucelles
1970 Vega Sicilia Unico
1998 Remirez de Ganuza
1999 Pietre Rosse Dalle Valle
1995 Ravenswood zinfandel Monte Rosso Vineyard
1991 Mondavi Cabernet Reserve
1996 Williams Selyem Pinot Noir Coastlands Vineyard
2002 Dutch Henry chardonnay Los Carneros
2003 Dutch Henry Pinot Noir
1999 Dutch Henry Reserve Cabernet
2002 Dutch Henry zinfandel

AFTER A DICTATOR

Today I mailed out a short story manuscript entitled

HOMESICKNESS: IN A DICTATOR'S AFTERMATH

These are stories written between 1996 and 2000, mostly touching on the diasporic aftermath of the Ferdinand Marcos dictatorship. I'd not focused on that body of work for a while as its style of linear narrative was so distracting from the direction of my poetry. Fortunately, my poetry has grown to accommodate it....

...and I also think that now is the time for these stories to raise their heads again, that is, post 9-1-1 and this current administration's war policy. I'm gonna go out on a limb here and project that this publisher will take this book. In a way, it's made for them.

When one wants to conjure, one must not be afraid of subsequently looking foolish...yadda. Wave bastardized flamenco gesture to conjure: TAKE MY MANUSCRIPT!

YOU'RE JUST AN E-MAIL AWAY, PART II

Silly of me not to have done this earlier -- but, yes, a copy of THE FIRST HAY(NA)KU ANTHOLOGY, Co-Edited by Jean Vengua and Mark Young (Meritage Press, Fall 2005), also will be part of prize package for the Summer Pleasure Poetry Contest. See full details in prior post! We are just three days away from deadline!

YOU'RE JUST AN E-MAIL AWAY

from participating in the Summer Pleasure Contest whose deadline is five days away! Here are the details:

WINEPOETICS' SUMMER PLEASURE POETRY CONTEST

Deadline: August 30, 2005
No Submission Fees
Email submissions within the body of email to GalateaTen@aol.com

Submit 1-2 poems to a "pleasure-able" poetry contest sponsored by The Chatelaine's Poetics (http://chatelaine-poet.blogspot.com) and Meritage Press (www.meritagepress.com). No restrictions on form or interpretations of "pleasure."

Members of OENOPHILES FOR POETRY (a for-profit, private organization) will judge the entrants -- probably during a meeting while they're also judging some wines (so consider that fair warning if, uh, that's something you need to be warned about). The poet whose poem most pleases the judges will receive wine (see end of this post) and the following poetry or poetry/art collections:

CATALOGUE: LIFE AS TABLEWARE by Ivy Alvarez
(Info at http://ivyai.blogspot.com/)

BRIDGEABLE SHORES: SELECTED POEMS 1961-2001 by Luis Cabalquinto
(Info at http://www.kaya.com/bs.html)

ER, UM by Garrett Caples and Hu Xin
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

PLAINWATER by Anne Carson

IDUNA by kari edwards
(Info at http://www.obooks.com/books/iduna.htm)

AFTER TAXES by Thomas Fink
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/fink2.htm)

MUSEUM OF ABSENCES by Luis H. Francia
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/museum.htm)

THE TIME AT THE END OF THIS WRITING by Paolo Javier
(Info at http://www.sendecki.com/ahadada/store/product_info.php?products_id=28)

POLES APART by Mark Young and Jukka-Pekka Kervinen
(Info at http://www.lulu.com/content/93289)

BETWEEN EARTH AND SKY by Sandy McIntosh
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/mcintosh1.htm)

WATERMARK by Jacquelyn Pope
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/pope.htm)

OPERA: POEMS 1981-2002 by Barry Schwabsky
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

[WAYS] by Barry Schwabsky and Hong Seung-Hye
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

STRANGE CURRENCIES by Daniel Sendecki
(Info at http://www.sendecki.com/ahadada/store/product_info.php?products_id=33)

REPRODUCTIONS OF THE EMPTY FLAGPOLE by Eileen R. Tabios
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/tabios1.htm)

MENAGE A TROIS WITH THE 21ST CENTURY by Eileen R. Tabios
(Info at http://www.oovrag.com/books/2004xpress.shtml)

AUTUMN SONATA: SELECTED POEMS OF GEORGE TRAKL (English versions by Daniel Simko; Introduction by Carolyn Forche)

THE ANCHORED ANGEL: SELECTED WRITINGS BY JOSE GARCIA VILLA
(Info at http://www.kaya.com/aa.html)

100 MORE JOKES FROM THE BOOK OF THE DEAD by John Yau and Archie Rand
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

as well as Meritage Press' Fall 2005 releases: THE OBEDIENT DOOR, the first poetry collection by Sean Finney with drawings by Ward Schumaker; and THE FIRST HAY(NA)KU ANTHOLOGY co-edited by Jean Vengua and Mark Young.

Last but not least, if the contest winner lives in a U.S. state that allows alcohol to be shipped from California, said contest winner will also receive a bottle of fine wine chosen by Eileen Tabios, "The Chatelaine Poet" aka "Missy WinePoetics."

[Pls direct all queries to Eileen Tabios @ GalateaTen@aol.com]

From the ever-beloved "Achilles and Gabriela Series"
AN EXCUSE TO BLOG BECAUSE...

So today was Marsh Hawk Press day in San Francisco! (And, by the way, did you all catch the earlier news that Denise Duhamel will be the judge of the next annual poetry contest -- go to the Marsh Hawk Blog or Website for details). Specifically, Thomas Fink fed me a Chinese lunch -- vegetable spring rolls, chicken in garlic sauce and squid in black bean sauce. Yum. Then Madeline Tiger treated me to a glass of sangiovese at the SF MOMA cafe. Yum again. Feed Moi and you're my best friend!

The plumping of moi belly wouldn't necessarily be worth me going onto blog to blather. But I really just needed to an excuse to post a picture of a Filipino cousin of Achilles and Gabriela -- this is 6-week-old Midas! As we told Midas' human daddy, "Midas once saved the drunken Dionysos so being from Napa Valley we approve of his mythological roots!"

"Filipino cousin," by the way, means ascribing relative status to those who biologically may not be related. Anyway, I never saw Achilles at 6 weeks of age but imagine he must have looked something like this cutie who turns anything he touches to gold:

ALWAYS BOOKISH #2

So this Monday I'd posted that I was so stressed that I queried a publisher about a non-existent book. Much to my surprise, the publisher replied they'd now like to see the manuscript. Shitski -- well then, I'd better write the damn thing.

I wonder what I'll come up with in 48 hours. Me and Moi BEEG MOUTH.

ADDRESSING

I've been thinking recently of how poets reach out to touch someone, as the advert goes. An overt way, of course, is the pronoun "You." But I've been thinking about how I seem to be noticing many (well, many in the relative scheme of things) deliberately using endearments to the Youse who, let's face it, are unknown to them.

Addressing strangers as "Dear" or "Dear Love" or "Pumpkin" et al. And I just recalled "Beloveds" in Juliana's latest. In ENGLISH, I have a poem entitled "DEAR ONE."

Anyway, there's something in the air that poet-peeps are addressing. And I suspect that, directly, the matter ain't one of Love. (Perhaps subsequently if not ultimately, but not directly...)

Oh, the times -- Dear You Whom I Address Untranslatably...

TOM FINK IN TOWN FOR THE BAY AREA POETRY MARATHON!

So my Tokyo trip got cancelled. This, however, allows me to meet the poet-painter Thomas Fink for dinner and chats today and tomorrow in San Francisco. Tom is in town to participate in this Saturday's Bay Area Poetry Marathon -- sadly, I can't make it but you all should go: details here!

Tom also brought me a new painting! Entitled "Burrito Imbalance #7", it's part of a painting series which is named after a recent poem; the painting's imagery mimics the shapes of texts against the page -- you can see those very interesting shapes (and good poems) in the Aught Issue 14 that features Tom's work (vizpo!). (Painting is acrylic on canvas, 8 X 10 -- just noting this for further input to the Art Blog later when I return to Galatea). Meanwhile, thanks Tom and y'all enjoy the marathon!

ALWAYS BOOKISH!

If you can stand watching moi inept flamenco -- and perhaps jasmine perfume will help compensate -- you can catch moi latest new book development here.

Thank you, Bill -- your Aug. 22 post about how Moria Poetry has taken on a global presence -- YaY! -- makes me even more grateful for the news. I'm sure your new books imprint will take off as much as the journal. I was just reading the other day that, over at Ahadada Books, Daniel Sendecki's The Witness has gotten at least 4,500 downloads since it was placed on their site. Yep -- sure beats the typical 1,000-3,000 initial small press print runs for hard copy books.

It's an old story by now how poets, particularly those attempting something "new" (don't shoot me for using that word; I'm as much a fan as anyone else of curatorial convenience when I get lazy), gravitate towards new ways to distribute their works. Once, it was the mimeo (but many of which publications would come to be reprinted in perfect bound volumes once a readership caught up with the art). Now it's the internet. But all to the good -- it wasn't that long ago that various folks were unable to get over the snob factor of hard copy vs online print. But numbers are numbers: as a poet, would you rather share your work with 4,500 or 1,000 readers?

Of course, to know Moi is to know Moi is a luddite. I love books -- the very feel of those pages. So I'm heartened, too, that Moria's book imprint features both online and hard copy features.

Also, let's not forget that in some parts of the world, the internet is not, after all, the "cheap" alternative. The net requires computers and the money to buy them and pay for internet access. So having the option of printed books means I can send some copies over to those parts of the world where one need not be able to afford a computer in order to read my poems.

Anyway, I am just ... purrrring over the whole thing.

...And as she logs offline, her hands twitching in more inept flamenco, her Peeps hear a cackle ... scented by a whiff of crushed sampaguita blooms...

THE OBEDIENT DOOR!

Okay. And if you really pay attention and read through the whole post below, you'll even save a BUCK! Who ever said there'd be no cash value to being one of Moi Peeps?!

A NEW RELEASE SPECIAL: THE OBEDIENT DOOR by SEAN TUMOANA FINNEY

Title: The Obedient Door
Author: Sean Tumoana Finney
Cover: PAPERBACK
Pub Date: 01 Sept 2005
Publisher: Meritage Press
ISBN: 0-9709179-4-5
Price: $14.95
Pages: 80

Meritage Press is pleased to announce a release special on Sean Tumoana Finney's debut poetry collection. The Obedient Door, with original drawings by San Francisco illustrator Ward Schumaker, is available at a significant discount through September 31. Early orders qualify for free shipping, $3 dollars off the cover price, and a guarantee that you’ll receive a limited first edition by a writer John Ashbery calls a rule breaker who makes it work.

The Obedient Door is an argument for awareness, for seeing and feeling those volumes of our experience not trodden by the shortcuts of social nicety. Finney’s first book is also his loneliest, where he speed dates verse in attempts to make lasting combinations. His influences include the New York School, Beckett, Lorca, and Chinese, Japanese, and Islamic poetry. The Obedient Door issues from a desire to know the past and its languages, to find alternatives, new lexicons, other people's boundaries to force words between.

Finney's collection has received the following advance praise from John Ashbery:

Sean Finney's cheerfully slipshod poems recycle urban moments that don't quite add up to a time, moods that may be part of a relationship, or not, unclassifiable afternoon afterthoughts and changes in temperature: "which song brings stone's rise and water's fall / into the bending of wrists and ankles / and broken corners for dust to change light." These are lines from his poem "What the Leopards Reject." We would be wise to reject the leopards' whims and feast on the scraps he has so eloquently assembled for us, which are in fact those of life itself.

BIOS
Sean Finney is a poet, journalist and copywriter living in San Francisco. He was born farther west, in Hawaii, but he likes to claim that Rome, where he lived as a teenager, is his spiritual home. This is his first book. His website is www.stfinney.com

Ward Schumaker is a San Francisco based illustrator who has illustrated two books for the acclaimed Yolla Bolly Press: Paris France by Gertrude Stein, and Two Kitchens in Provence by M.F.K. Fisher. His website is www.warddraw.com

NEW RELEASE OFFER
Through Meritage Press' release offer, you can obtain The Obedient Door at a 20% discount plus receive free shipping & handling (normally a $3.00 value at Media Rate) if you are a U.S. resident. For each book, please send $12 (checks made out to "Meritage Press") to

Eileen Tabios
Publisher, Meritage Press
256 North Fork Crystal Springs Road
St. Helena, CA 94574

For more information, contact MeritagePress@aol.com

*******

So above is the official press release. But if you say in your order that you read this offer at this blog, thus identifying yourself as a Moi Peep, you can shave a buck off the cost of the book -- to you, Dear Peep: that's a Release Special Price of $11 vs the $12 charged to those who don't read Moi! Hah!

THAT VAUNTED EMBARASSMENT OF RICHES

Just this moment I received I Take Thee, English, for My Beloved by Eileen Tabios (Marsh Hawk Press), a pulchritudinous 10x7x1¼ 'brick', as Eileen calls it. I daresay I have an 800 page manuscript myself. I think, basically, we are enjoying the ride, and the work will continue until we don't. I almost would like it to stop [...] but it won't be me who gives in first.
--Allen Bramhall on the Antic Blog with Jeff Harrison

Yesterday, I got word that a new manuscript of mine found a home with a publisher -- more details later. Says something about what's on my desk that my second reaction (the first being the natural glee) is, Whew: glad that's for a book I've already written!

My back really aches. The poems are scales and though I try to slough them off as much as possible on unsuspecting (nay, make that beloved) poetry publishers, that effin' epidermis just won't thin.

My back really really really aches.

Despite moments of peace, Poetry ain't generally peaceful, is it.

A BLOGGIE ROUND-UP TO SAVE ME FROM MOISELF

A tough weekend. Latest attempt to find a dog-sitter blew up. Among the casualties, the psyche and meals of moi dawgs, what had been a newly-fixed kitchen screen door and another five years shaved off my life span. If I don't find a solution in the next couple of days, I'll have to postpone a trip to Japan already booked, paid for, and originally skedded to begin this Wednesday.

Also had to do a quickie in and out of Los Angeles to help shepherd a niece through a private school interview/audition. I'ma too old to be pickin' my way through Southwest's peanuts twice within a 24-hour span. Plus, the whole thing unnecessarily became more fraught than needed for me since I know full well -- too well -- that what I'm trying to do with my niece in terms of guidance is something I'd always wanted but never gotten from my parents whose befuddlements as new immigrants (back then) inevitably affected their abilities to guide their children in a new land (that sentence says it badly but I think you can get the drift of the unfortunate extra layer of psychological impact that this activity generated).

I was so stressed that to divert myself, at one point, I sent out a query to a publisher for a still non-existent book. I mean, if the publisher expresses interest, then I figger I'd do the book. I don't know how such a strategy helps ease pressure rather than add to said pressure -- but that's what Moi gets for being such a perverse little thingie.

Fortunately, came back to some reading in blogland that lifted the spirits and made the body feel less tired:

Thankee to Allen for all those good words blogged re my last 3 books. It's particularly heartening to hear from someone who has empathy with BEEEG WORKS. He cited Robert Duncan. Moi look at him's been cursory, to date. I suppose I should move him up higher on my to-do list.

Then Lorna Dee Cervantes continues amazin' work re the hay(na)ku -- said efforts making ever likely the need for a SECOND HAY(NA)KU ANTHOLOGY when we haven't even come out yet with the FIRST! (But due soon!)

Speaking of such, a generous Karri Kokko backchannel guides me (and my nascent Finn-speak) through a fabulous vizpo hay(na)ku by a poet new to me, Marko Niemi. According to Karri, Marko calls his variation "fractal hay(na)ku." The scheme goes like:

hay(na)ku
hay(na)ku hay(na)ku
hay(na)ku hay(na)ku hay(na)ku

Karri wrote out the first one from #3, so that we can see how poems are structured:

kerran
toivon heidät
joilla hellät kammat

Karri adds, "You should also note that all the words in these poems have six letters! // In my mind, this is not only wonderful poetry, but it shows there're no limits to the hay(na)ku."

Thanks for the word, Karri! And thanks as well to Marko.

Last but never least, Mark Young comes up with yet another doozy of an idea. Because Mark's idea is so brilliant, Moi wants to insinuate herself into that process to take some credit: to wit, the PUNCTUATIONS COME ALIVE MISCHIEVOUSLY

with Mark's notion of a new series "Things I Never Told My Roshi"! See his first post here and which I must replicate below as it just sends me:

things I never told my roshi #1

When I sit crosslegged during zazen in the zendo, I seek to find, as the precursor to clearing my mind of all thoughts, that single point where the equilibrium between what Alan Watts called "the woman in man" - &, obviously, the opposite / the same, the man in woman – finds its perfect balance. But as I draw near to it, I am distracted by the conflict of those gender stereotypes that have imprinted themselves on me over the years. Even now, when I have resolved most of the physical issues, they flutter, like trapped moths, at the edges of the empty plain I seek to surround myself with.

I see myself wearing workmans boots & a tutu. When I dance, I dance alone. Nobody wants to catch me in my jetés because I have been known to draw blood from my partners when I accidently land on them on the points of my steel caps.

& I am reluctant to climb ladders. It is not the height that frightens me, simply that the other firemen look up my skirt.


*****

Mark says the series comes from reading an excerpt from Leny Strobel's essay "The Secret of Punctuations" -- it is a brilliant essay. To read it in its totality of course, you'll have to purchase my book next year (heh): THE SECRET LIVES OF PUNCTUATIONS, VOL. I (xPress(ed), 2006).

And, Leny, I bet you never thought that essay would help engender such things as ... firemen in tutus!

YOU ARE LOVINGLY INVITED TO ...

This just in and confirmedfrom moi publisher. Please to put on your calendar! I do hope to see you there!!!


LAUNCH FOR MARSH HAWK PRESS FALL TITLES!

You are invited to:

The Marsh Hawk Press Launch for Fall Authors and Titles:

THE AFTER-DEATH HISTORY OF MY MOTHER by Sandy McIntosh

I TAKE THEE, ENGLISH, FOR MY BELOVED by Eileen Tabios

WHITHER NON-STOPPING by Harriet Zinnes

7-9 p.m.
Friday, September 23, 2005
Poets' House
72 Spring Street
New York City

READING TO WRITE

It's pretty magical -- when you read something and then the words decide to dance with your brain's eyelashes and form themselves into a poem you can resend out to the world. The by-line "By ___fill in poet's name" can never capture this process.

And I'ma thinking of this, not only coz of prior post but, because I stumbled across a hay(na)ku I wrote a few days ago which I initially titled "FOR ERNESTO PRIEGO" only because the words came from some prose I read on his blog (which I'm sure I'm not the only one to feel is among the most affecting and resonant in blogland). I can't remember the date of Ernesto's blog post -- but, certainly, Muchas Gracias to Ernesto for the inspiration:

UNTITLED (A SELF)

Deleting
phone number
therefore someone's name

breaks
something, irrevocably,
inside of you

WHEN BOOKS RETURN YOUR LOVE

The first "list poem" I ever wrote was given to me -- I was in a bookstore scanning some shelves and, suddenly, various titles arranged themselves into a poem. You can see it in the Archives of Moria Poetry here; it's called "Untitled (Bookstore), 2000" and you gotta scroll to mid-page.

Well, something similar happened today. I was in a bookstore and a title offered itself up to me as a poem. Specifically, a hay(na)ku! I'ma fairly sure it's partly inspired by Karri Kokko's idea of taking novels' first lines and turning them into hay(na)ku. My first hay(na)ku variation offa the basic tercet form is the

TITLED HAY(NA)KU.

Here's one, of a book written by Jon Kabot-Zin:

Wherever
You Are
There You Are

Nifty, eh? The book's subtitle is "Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life" which explains something about the title.

Anyhoo, scan those bookshelves -- I'm sure there's more than one title out there just dying to be transformed into a poem!

Don't ask me how I came to suspect, though, that this particular poem is most willing to reveal itself to book lovers....

IT'S THE MORNING AFTER AND I DON'T REGRET IT

Get your mind outta the gutter -- I ain't talkin' (yet again) about sex. I'ma talkin' about my rambling commentary over at Timothy Yu's which ends with responding to a query by Stephen about my work, to wit:

Thanks for the mention, Stephen. And in response to your comment, in my work, I don't usually address defined communities but individual readers, which is not to say I'm disinterested in communities. It's just that I aim for poems that generate new communities or new perspectives (not to say I succeed). An aesthetic matter, of course. But also a reason for the irony of why, despite my work with AAWW and editing a number of AA anthologies, my own poetry is not popular in AA academia. Fortunately, I see the logic in that result.

(I hope I don't wake up tomorrow regretting I posted this comment -wink.)

Heeee.

But, anyway, Tim's post was partly generated by a Ron comment about "community." This reminds me of when Ron mentioned some days/weeks back something like "new Filipino American poetry" as a community that is "ethnically-constructed." And such contrasts with poetry communities constructed along styles (small "s") of writing.

I think the model that Pinoy Poets offer to ye poets interested in community is that we respect each other's ways of writing even when different from ours (I can't recall a single instance of a Filipino poet dissing another Filipino poet due to writing style; wardrobe, mebbe, but not the way the poems are written) -- and actually, it may be more basic. Sure, we can have our tiffs with each other....but there is, I sense, a love for each other (call it that Filipino trait of "loob") that doesn't exist in many "poetry" communities. That love is a community glue.

But anyway, why not form communities -- POETRY COMMUNITIES -- that aren't based on particular categories or styles of writing? "Poetry community" seems as difficult to define as "Asian America" (see Tim's blog). But I remind the obvious -- there are two words in the phrase "poetry community" -- why not be with people you WANT to commune with for other reasons than how they write? How about the contents of their refrigerators? (Al Robles once told me, communities are difficult to form if those communities can't eat together -- not to say you hermit-minded Peeps need to be gaining weight for that community but that you would actually like each other's company).

And, for me, the reason I commune with others who write differently from me is because there is a useful poetics rationale: I can keep checking my work against non-like-minded work, which can be as valuable as keeping company. I mean, sheesh, I for one would never want to be known as a "fourth-generation poet" in any thing.

This may mean you risk ending up an obscure poet (since canon-makers tend to support that which affirms their own work) but at least one lives with self-respect in one's lifetime (and, as a poet, I'd still rather end up unknown if I only ended up being known as a fourth generation poet in ____________/fill in the blank).

Yes, I know that "permission" is important to various peeps in their poetic developments and so finding like-minded company is important. But you can also form communities with others whose poetries differ from yours. After all, to do otherwise is to imply that Poetry is just words. Well, heee....the angels are laughing so hard they're pissing.

THIS MADE ME GIGGLE

Gura Michelle on "The Secrets of Punctuations," which begins:

"Do exclamation points dream of curling into a question mark? Are semi-colons the unspoken children of the affair between colons and commas? Would a square bracket have surgery to look more like a squiggly braket?"

Thanks Michelle (and as well for helping me earlier post that postcard of punctuation secret hotel trysts -- scroll below). Michelle, by the way, has a poem blog DASH POETRY which now includes hay(na)ku!

BEYOND THE IRON GATE

So, I'm always interested in trying new. So, sigh. I'ma gonna try THIS for a while to see what happens.

RECENTLY, MOSTLY RELISHED

The word 'devotion' is an exponent of the deeply personal. It is more than love or affection--it is a purchase on the sublime. It is transcendent. It is the keystone in an arch of exaltation. It sounds silly in the mouth of a teenager. But in the mouth of someone over 60 it embarrasses us a little with its lambent sincerity. It acquires the weight of reality. It shakes with the light of veneration. It is wound with the fiber of experience so that it cannot be mere giddy emotion. It is the real deal.
--John Olson on Clayton Eshleman's MY DEVOTION (Black Sparrow, 2004)

BOOKS/COLLECTIONS:
ON MEXICAN TIME, memoir by Tony Cohan
E.E. CUMMINGS: A Biography by Christopher Sawyer-Laucanno
DRINKING THE RAIN, memoir by Alix Kates Shulman
BONESHAKER, poems by Jan Beatty
WALKING TO MARTHA'S VINEYARD, poems by Franz Wright
A COMMERCE OF MOMENTS, poems by Sofia M. Starnes
XING, poems by Ron Silliman
NOTES FROM A ROMAN TERRACE, memoir by Joan Marble
HUNGER, novel by Elise Blackwell
GOOD HARBOR, novel by Anita Diamant

Also, via a link from Ron and how glad (!) I am that Ron wrote his post today, the Clayton Eshleman issue by YGDRASIL: A JOURNAL OF THE ARTS. I mention this as I heartily second Ron's recommendation to download, for free, this issue -- fabulous poems, not to mention a lovely review by John Olson (another poet whose poems I love/recommend) of Eshleman's 2004 book MY DEVOTION (Black Sparrow).

And there's always something for everyone at the Chatty Blog -- for those awaiting a pop romance read by Moi (and I know that's many of you sheepish Peeps), that would be MAN WITH A PAST by Jayne Krentz)

WINE
1989 Beaucastel
1996 Cherise
2002 Dutch Henry chardonnay Los Carneros
1992 Domaine L'Aigueliere Montpeyroux
1991 Domaine Trevallon
2004 Dutch Henry cabernet franc (barrel tasting)
1998 Fox Creek

READ BUT NOT RELISHED
A NEW SELECTED POEMS by Galway Kinnell (not that these are bad poems but, for some reason, the word "bombast" comes to mind...I'll re-read in the future in case I just had a bad reading day that day during my day with Galway...)

MY CULTURAL ACTIVISM: HELPING PREVENT POETRY'S STATUS AS "OTHER"

Thanks to Jean for the nice comments re my Punctuations project ... of course, I like eroticizing anything ... but the brilliant Dr. Leny shows why Moi punctuations (despite their hotel trysts--scroll below) are not just about sex. Here's an excerpt from Leny's essay which she wrote for my 2006 book as an Afterword; ever since I tested the idea with Ron who kindly did it for English, I've liked the idea of actually integrating a (a, not the) reader into poetry books ... because (my) Poetry can't exist if my poems aren't received:

EXCERPT FROM LENY M. STROBEL'S "THE SECRETS OF PUNCTUATIONS"

"I never told the Roshi this: I have cheated during zazen at the zendo. Instead of counting my breaths and following the comings and goings of thoughts while sitting, I stare at the wall in order to tease out a story lurking within the veins of the wood’s grain and the gnarls in its nubs. I see an awe-struck eye. A creased brow. An upturned lip. Sometimes there is a mirage that invites an interpretation, a nudge in one’s memory bank of a forgotten story.

"I am aware that there are rules to be mastered if one is to attain the state of Emptiness. Yet something tells me that I can bend the rules if only to see what lies behind the disobedience. Emptiness can wait.

"Punctuation marks remind me of this. The rules of English grammar on punctuation are succinct, non-negotiable. That is why my grade school teacher didn’t spare the rod in order to discipline us on their correct usage. Over time we demonstrated perfect mimicry, ever mindful of the dire consequences of a misplaced mark -- a red mark of failure or a slap on the wrist. We learned our punctuation lessons well.

"Now we rarely notice them except when they are mis-used. Perhaps that is the point: One is never meant to notice them and yet upon this invisibility a writer builds an elegant sentence or a scaffold of ideas making reading pleasurable. Pause here (,). This clause is independent of the next (;). Exclude this []. This points to this (:). End here(.) and so on…

"For a postcolonial subject like me, the rules of English usage didn’t come in a vacuum. They came in nicely packaged as a “gift” from the empire to its colonial outposts -- so that what is unintelligible might become intelligible; what is obscure might become clear; what is dis-united can be united within one language. So much the better for management of the empire and its unruly colonies.

"Time has been kind to the life of Punctuations. The rules are still more or less fixed and undaunted by the malevolent and mischievous tricks played by nativized englishers (non-native English speakers). Partly, it is their invisibility or lurking presence that do not invite grave attention from the grammar police.

"Now comes The Secret Lives of Punctuations, Vol. I by Eileen Tabios. What happens when a poet decides to foreground punctuation marks and gives them a life of their own?"

*****

BUT MY FAVORITE EXCERPT? It's this paragraph -- which is what I mean by my desire to be a "cultural activist" for Poetry (boldface mine for emphasis) (when I first met Leny, she professed much confusion about Poetry...but now she's a purty fine poet herself!):

"In a way, I see Eileen de-familiarizing punctuations in these poems. In giving them new and not-so secret lives, she challenges the reader to conjure new relationships, new images, new stories. What was new and difficult for me in taking on these abstract poems is the musicality that wasn’t easily evident at first glance. Perhaps that, too, is conditioned by my inherited sense of rhyme and rhythm coming from certain places (e.g. hip-hop, Cordillera rhythms, salsa) that doesn’t include poetry. In this exercise, I needed and wanted to expand the boundaries of my experience of what is musical. In this sense, poetry has ceased to be an “Other” for me."

WANNA KAYAK WITH MOI HAY(NA)KU?

Smoooochie, smoooooochie! And the Chatelaine smooches that poetic form once more before shooing it outa the window. Blue sky out there, she coos at it -- go now. Nice of you to return to kiss Mama Moi but do keep going out there to spread your sapphire delights...!

So to speak.

So, I've spent the last few days and expect to continue spending the next few days working with Mark, Jean and Jukka on the design et al work to send THE FIRST HAY(NA)KU ANTHOLOGY over to the printer's! Should be out soooooooon!

But meanwhile, the hay(na)ku continues to do its thing! Why, just in today's snailmail, what do Moi get but an utterly enchanting postcard from Scotland -- from dear Ivy when she was sojourning at Hawthornden Castle! And what does the postcard reveal? A new variation on the hay(na)ku -- specifically a MIRROR HAYNAKU! To wit:

folded, tattered quilt
blankets my
fever
fever
blankets my
faded, tattered quilt

Why Salamat, Sweetie. And speaking of more Sweetness....how's about Karri Kokko's -- and, one more time; WE LOVE FINNISH NAMES! -- idea of hay(na)ku created from first lines of novels! Like,

It
was love
at first sight.

from Joseph Heller's Catch-22!

Or as we all should know as to play on the internet should be to play internationally, what Karri says is the most famous opening line in all of Finnish literature. We all know what that is, right Peeps? It's a trilogy written by Väinö Linna, called Täällä Pohjantähden alla (Under the North Star). To wit:

Alussa
olivat suo,
kuokka — ja Jussi.

This blog ain't all about sexy w(h)ine, you know. You come here (pun intended), and you still learn something (heh: I first typed, leer something...well, leer is better...)

THE PUNCTUATIONS REVEAL IN WHICH HOTEL THEY'VE BEEN CONCOCTING THEIR SECRET TRYSTS

So, because I decided to participate in the International Hand Made PostCard Exhibition next year in Malaysia, I ended up revealing The Secrets of Punctuations! Here is the postcard art -- with an "Artist Statement" below. As with all of Moi artist's statements, they mostly reflect the wines I drink whilst writing out said statements...



FIRST DRAFT
ARTIST STATEMENT:
"THE SECRET LIVES OF PUNCTUATIONS"

Mixed Media (cut-up postcard from The Peninsula, a New York City hotel; Singer brass snap fasteners, Scotch tape; red and blue ink), 5 X 7" (2005)

My 2006 poetry collection is titled THE SECRET LIVES OF PUNCTUATIONS, VOL. I (xPress(ed), Espoo, Finland -- thanks Jukka!). I thought to create a postcard image that manifested its theme.

I chose a postcard from a hotel as trysts, a form of secrets, can be held in hotels. I cut a strip from the bottom of the original card to size it at 5 X 7", one of the two sizes allowed for becoming part of the INTERNATIONAL HAND MADE POSTCARD EXHIBITION (IHMP Exhibition).

I then divided the sliced-off strip into five portions, atop of which I wrote five punctuations addressed in my book: colon, semi-colon, parenthesis, question mark and ellipsis. I chose red ink to feature the punctuations as red is the color for passion…and lipstick.

Using a snap fastener, I pinned each of these symbolized punctuations to one of the hotel rooms of the hotel. There is a sixth snap-on fastener missing a punctuation, both to symbolize "secret" and to reference the punctuation not represented from my book: the strike-through (a line struck across letter(s)).

I used snap fasteners to pin the punctuations against a hotel room because these fasteners are usually used in clothing. So to unsnap or snap them references undressing and dressing - activities relevant to (secret) trysts.

I also used the snap fasteners in a reverse way; the back - not the front -- of the fasteners are what's visible, again to reference secrets in that the "normal" public façade of the object has been subverted or masked. In addition, I made visible the back components of the snap fastener because I actually found them more pleasing to the eye - which is to say, more appropriate from a formal (sculptural) point of view and to imply that the secrets of punctuations provide pleasure. The latter element is significant since the work refers to a poetry book and it is my ideal that poems give pleasure to their readers or viewers.

I wrote the title atop the postcard, then placed scotch tape across the title. I did so to prevent the ink from further bleeding, but also to reference how the ink is now "masked" by tape, but visible from beneath the mask/tape. The visibility of the secrets is, of course, a component for revealing which punctuation is unfolding its secret within which hotel room.

Those involved in secret hotel trysts rarely send out postcards about their acts - but because my poetry collection reveals "the secrets of punctuations," I also thought the postcard medium to be appropriate for it proclaims a message to the world. Specifically, even if a postcard is mailed to a specific recipient, the fact that its message is not hidden from postal service workers and others who may see it means that its message is "public."

Relatedly, I intend for my poems to be "postcards" to the entire universe.

ON POET-PAINTERS/ARTISTS

Did you know that the current U.S. Poet Laureate is a poet-painter? I didn't. The only reason I know is that this week he sent me a postcard and the postcard image happened to be of "Golden Rule," which is identified as a 1978 acrylic on oil by Ted Kooser.

I don't know him personally, btw, except as, with this postcard, a very nice person.

Anyway, what I noticed about "Golden Rule" is that HEY, IT AIN'T A BAD PAINTING AT ALL! Second, its subject is the front of a barbershop with the words emblazoned on the windows "GOLDEN RULE BARBER SERVICE." The style can be called realism bordering on (but clearly not) superrealism; images that depict windows and glass do often allow the painter to show one's technical prowess.

But my first reaction to the painting and learning that 'twas painted by Mr. Kooser was, OF COURSE IT'S REALISTIC! Because said realism fits his poetry writing style which his official website describes as "known for its clarity, precision and accessibility."

I happened to see Brent Cunningham the day I got Mr. Kooser's postcard. Brent is also a poet-painter and author of the brilliant new collection Bird & Forest (Ugly Duckling Presse) that I'm currently reading (I don't overstate this: BRILLIANT--click here for samples except that the effect of seeing a lot more than 3 poems by Brent has the sum is greater than its parts effect). Brent's first reaction to Mr. Kooser's postcard was the same as mine.

Thing is, I don't recall ever seeing an exception to the observation that narrative poets would paint realistically and, uh, how to put it, more elliptical (?) poets tend to paint abstractly. These terms are all used for curatorial convenience but you peeps are smart and undoubtedly get moi drift as regards moi comparisons here. (E-mail me if you got an exception to this rule, please).

I have written both narratively and elliptically. When I do moi lousy attempts to be a visual artist, what's my artistic form? Performance, conceptual and installation art -- forms that, for me, lend themselves to transcending categories like "figurative" vs "abstract". (Speaking of such, I consider the 504-page ENGLISH to be my first successful poetic/text/book manifestation of installation art...it's all circular, ya know).

It's not just painting, of course. If you're familiar with the works of sculptor Carl Andre, it'd make sense that he'd write something like

"In my poetry I do not try to find the words to express what I want to say.
In my poetry I try to find ways to express what the words have to say."

which I actually loved and ended up using as an epigraph to one of my poems, "BANNED AND DETERMINED" (which I reprint at bottom of this post).

Anyway, I guess what I'm thinking is that one can predict, within the group of poet-painters/artists, the styles of their art based on their text, and vice versa. And I think that predictability ... is something that more of these peeps need to loosen, break up and test. Why not? Spice it up, folks -- the matter is our buddy Art. Or as Mr. Kooser wrote to Moi:

"I wish you the best of success in your writings."

Poet-painter/artist Peep: I'ma talkin' about YOU.

*****

I reprint this poem here as a way for me to blog-file-cabinet this version, which is updated from the version that appears in ENGLISH:

BANNED AND DETERMINED

"In my poetry I do not try to find the words to express what I want to say.
In my poetry I try to find ways to express what the words have to say."
—Carl Andre

A situation
that temporarily defeats
all training,
all articulated philosophies

Rosenquist fragments
explode in billboard sizes
even as focus narrows

A hallmark of criticism:
this "deeply felt response"

And so the day begins
with a wish
for color not to equal narrative
since the sky is shivering forth
gray

PLEASURE'S PRIZE GROWS TO BECOME ... STRANGE CURRENCY!

I am heartened by the entrants coming into the Chatelaine's and Meritage Press' August Pleasure Poetry Contest. I personally have been pleased by all submitted so far! And now, Daniel Sendecki's poetry collection from Ahadada Books, STRANGE CURRENCIES, has been added to the prize list. So I'm updating the contest info and reposting below. Do continue to send poems until the end of August!

[Pls feel free to forward]
WINEPOETICS' SUMMER PLEASURE POETRY CONTEST

Deadline: August 30, 2005
No Submission Fees
Email submissions within the body of email to GalateaTen@aol.com

Submit 1-2 poems to a "pleasure-able" poetry contest sponsored by The Chatelaine's Poetics (http://chatelaine-poet.blogspot.com) and Meritage Press (www.meritagepress.com). No restrictions on form or interpretations of "pleasure."

Members of OENOPHILES FOR POETRY (a for-profit, private organization) will judge the entrants -- probably during a meeting while they're also judging some wines (so consider that fair warning if, uh, that's something you need to be warned about). The poet whose poem most pleases the judges will receive wine (see end of this post) and the following poetry or poetry/art collections:

CATALOGUE: LIFE AS TABLEWARE by Ivy Alvarez
(Info at http://ivyai.blogspot.com/)

BRIDGEABLE SHORES: SELECTED POEMS 1961-2001 by Luis Cabalquinto
(Info at http://www.kaya.com/bs.html)

ER, UM by Garrett Caples and Hu Xin
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

PLAINWATER by Anne Carson

IDUNA by kari edwards
(Info at http://www.obooks.com/books/iduna.htm)

AFTER TAXES by Thomas Fink
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/fink2.htm)

MUSEUM OF ABSENCES by Luis H. Francia
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/museum.htm)

THE TIME AT THE END OF THIS WRITING by Paolo Javier
(Info at http://www.sendecki.com/ahadada/store/product_info.php?products_id=28)

POLES APART by Mark Young and Jukka-Pekka Kervinen
(Info at http://www.lulu.com/content/93289)

BETWEEN EARTH AND SKY by Sandy McIntosh
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/mcintosh1.htm)

WATERMARK by Jacquelyn Pope
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/pope.htm)

OPERA: POEMS 1981-2002 by Barry Schwabsky
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

[WAYS] by Barry Schwabsky and Hong Seung-Hye
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

STRANGE CURRENCIES by Daniel Sendecki
(Info at http://www.sendecki.com/ahadada/store/product_info.php?products_id=33)

REPRODUCTIONS OF THE EMPTY FLAGPOLE by Eileen R. Tabios
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/tabios1.htm)

MENAGE A TROIS WITH THE 21ST CENTURY by Eileen R. Tabios
(Info at http://www.oovrag.com/books/2004xpress.shtml)

AUTUMN SONATA: SELECTED POEMS OF GEORGE TRAKL (English versions by Daniel Simko; Introduction by Carolyn Forche)

THE ANCHORED ANGEL: SELECTED WRITINGS BY JOSE GARCIA VILLA
(Info at http://www.kaya.com/aa.html)

100 MORE JOKES FROM THE BOOK OF THE DEAD by John Yau and Archie Rand
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

as well as Meritage Press' Fall 2005 release: THE OBEDIENT DOOR, the first poetry collection by Sean Finney with drawings by Ward Schumaker.

Last but not least, if the contest winner lives in a U.S. state that allows alcohol to be shipped from California, said contest winner will also receive a bottle of fine wine chosen by Eileen Tabios, "The Chatelaine Poet" aka "Missy WinePoetics."

[Pls direct all queries to Eileen Tabios @ GalateaTen@aol.com]

PAGING YOUNG -- OKAY, ALL -- MEN, PART II

And the question is: can Toi bake?

I'M APPARENTLY GOING TO BE READ BY, UH, SOMEONE NAMED, UH, "BULLDOG"...ON HAWAII'S PUBLIC RADIO! NO BULL!

Paging Ye Peeps in Hawai'i!

So I'm mostly known for poetry but I do write in other lit forms. I haven't, however, written a short story in a looooooo....ooong time. So imagine moi pleased surprise to receive this email from Bamboo Ridge Co-Editor and fictionist Darrell Lum. Read it as it's self-explanatory -- I post it partly to ask my technical consultant -- yah I've heard of it but still don't know what the heck is that "internet streaming"...?

FROM DARRELL LUM:

Eileen and Juliet [Kono],

Just to let you know, your work has been selected to be read by Honolulu Theater for Youth actors, Bulldog and Nara Cardenas at the next taping of Aloha Shorts (our version of national public radio's "American Shorts" program of readings; details below). As you may already know, the selections are made from previously published stories in Bamboo Ridge and are aired on KIPO public radio on Mondays at 5 pm. We try our best to ensure that the story is read in its entirety with few edits within the 27 minute time limit. I don't know at this point when your program will air, but I will try to let you know. [Eileen, I know you won't be able to "tune in" but I know at least some of the public radio shows have audio streaming on the internet; search for KIPO or Hawaii Public Radio.]

The next ALOHA SHORTS taping
Sunday Augst 14 @ 7PM
Atherton Studio
Hawaii Public Radio
738 Kaheka Street (opposite Daiei)
955.8821

BULLDOG reads "TAPEY -- after Plato's 'The Symposium'" by EILEEN TABIOS
and NARA CARDENAS reads "ANNIVERSARY" by JULIET KONO

*****

Well isn't that special?! "Tapey," incidentally, is Filipino rice wine -- I remember it during cool summer evenings in my Philippine childhood, that is, in jars with the rice still fermenting on the bottom of said jars...clutched in the wiry hands of gaunt-faced uncles. Such are the roots to moi Napa Valley w(h)ining nowadays.

Also, this does remind me -- for all of you short story publishers out there (yeah, right), I do have a short story manuscript lying around somewhere...I don't remember much about those short stories except that they're all brilliantly written, of course.

Last but not least, Juliet Kono's name is referenced. If you don't know her, here's info about her from Darrell's email:
Juliet S. Kono has written two books of poems, Hilo Rains (1988 Bamboo Ridge Press) and Tsunami Years (1995 Bamboo Ridge Press) and a book of short stories Ho`olulu Park and the Pepsodent Smile and other stories (2004 Bamboo Ridge Press). She has won the Elliot Cades Award for Literature, the American Japanese National Literary Award, and the Ka Palapala Po`okela Award for Excellence in Literature. She was a recipient of a US/Japan Friendship Commission Creative Artist Exchange Fellowship in 1999. Born and raised in Hilo, she now lives in Honolulu and teaches English at Leeward Community College.

SOON, I SHALL CEASE SHOPPING

Well, my Shopping/Spending Blog, that is. As I announced on there yesterday, I'll cease that blog at the end of this month as it looks like I've done enough posts for the purpose of the larger project, AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF COMMODITIES. A relief: I've been surprised at how much one's shopping list reveals so much about a person -- not been so comfy with that. Why do you think the Chatelaine is just stuffed with personas?

Personas -- whatever it takes, too, of course, to make this Blog about ... YOU.

PAGING ALL YE YOUNG MEN!!! COME TO MAMA MOI!!!
(aka ANTI-BELL CURVE POETICS)

A
blue chrysanthemum
dissolves every father
--from "Black and Blue" by Scott Glassman

Okay. So where was I before Moi Joy -- which is to say YOUR Joy, oh Peeps whom I address if not undress -- was rudely interrupted by a missing kitty? Oh yeh:

PAGING ALL YOUNG MEN....!

To wit, I refer to that angstsy pansy post I did earlier (scroll down -- actually, don't bother) about how artists go through a bell curve in their development. Beatrice Wood proves me wrong -- and is now moi model for how to continue "keeping on..."! Sometimes, you just gotta forgo the fathers and go with the mothers!

Beata -- as she was known and I love that nickname -- is known as a major American potter. She died at age 105. She threw her last pot at 104.

We visited her former house and studio in Ojai and I can tell you that her aesthetic achievements didn't degrade with age. Good for her.

In an interview, she was asked about her secret for longevity and good livin' and good art-makin'. She replied (I can just feel the gusto): "Paintings, chocolate and young men."

Now, I've got the first two down. To suffer for moi Poetry, I thereby proclaim with much gusto, saliva and crooning:

OH YOUNG MEN, COME TO MAMA MOI!!!!

Come! Come!

(Pun intended).

Oh, wait -- I'ma starting to talk to you young uns like you're moi dawgs! Anyway....just trying to do what it takes to be a long-time Poet, don't begrudge Moi! Just come on over here to see into the fallen angels' eyes: jade, sapphire, ebony, lightning, mother-of-pearls, mirrors....

For instance, Scott Glassman -- you with the Lorcan hay(na)ku, how old are you anyway? Just kidding, in case this public outreach makes you apprehensive (for what it's worth, my duende-infused passes are made in private). Just an aside, here, Peeps to recommend Scott's latest hay(na)ku! [UPDATE: Not only is Scott not apprehensive but ... he's alerted me to his age (hee).]

Fans herself.

*****

I can just feel Tom's and other Peeps' hearts breaking. Okay, okay....actually, such is moi expanse that I'ma even more expansive (I first typed "expensive") than Beata. Make it all men, young and old. No need for Moi to privilege the firm pectoral over the beloved beer belly, or the firm bicep over the receding hairline. Moi enjoys it all!

So. Wanna come over and see moi paintings?

Don't forget the chocolates!

HUNTING FOR ARTEMIS
(AKA DEMETER POETICS)

As you might glean from reading moi blog, I love my pets -- they are my babies. I returned from Ojai, only to embark on a difficult search for Artemis as soon as we landed back on Galatea. Artemis is one of my two much-loved cats; the only reason you don't see kitty photos as much as dawg photos here on blog are that my cats are skittish. Anyway, we found Artemis too many hours later -- she's primarily an indoor cat but she'd slipped past the kitchen door and then through an unknown crack beneath some porch steps and got stuck.

But it was hours of hell as we're on a mountain and she's just yum yum prey for the critters who roam about at night -- from coyotes to foxes to eagles to mountain lions to bears to rattlesnakes (we had a rattlesnake coiled up against the front door just last week). We were also concerned as the day was near if not over 100 degrees and ....

The cats answer to the term "Sweetie." When I raise my voice to say "Sweetie," they unfailingly show up. It's the term I used on them when I first adopted them from the local shelter. So as I was hunting for Artemis, I kept yelling in a high-pitched voice, "Sweeeeeeeeeetie....!" up and down the mountain like some deranged mad woman (actually, at the time, I was a deranged mad woman), and then again while we cruised the neighborhood. And all along, trying to force down imaginary drastic scenarios for what could have happened to her. The all of it was just ... hell.

I probably sweated off 20 pounds in the heat, only to drink it all back later with wine as relief...

I mention all this on this "poetics" blog because, you know how when you're wanting something, some of you may pray to your God and promise X, Y, Z in exchange for whatever you're wanting? I didn't do that.

What I did do was scream at the fallen angels even as I kept warbling "Sweetie" into the heated air. The fallen angels I've mythologized as the guardians of Poetry. And I ranted at them and PROMISED: if they didn't bring my cat, my baby Artemis, back into Mama Moi's cradling arms, I will quit Poetry.

No more poems.

No more books.

No more conceptual art projects.

No more hay(na)ku.

No more publishing on behalf of other poets.

No more poetry library -- I would burn all those books!

No more blogging.

No more poems no more poems no more poems....

My cat (was) returned. Artemis returned. Returned to my arms and a freshly-opened can of tuna.

Which is to say: I can give up Poetry. It's Poetry who can't give Moi up. This difference is significant. Now let me go think of how to concoct that significance.

But it will take some time -- I can honestly say that the hunt for Artemis is the longest negative energy moment ever that slipped in through the Iron Gate. And the Chatelaine is still battling the effect. My energy is low (and helps explain why Allen's unexpected and very generous comments recently on my work had an exponentially huge uplifting effect on my psyche -- thank you, Allen). All of today was spent purifying Galatea's space from adverse elements that manifested themselves into an attack on my beloved Artemis. My baby.

And I also needed to purify Galatea if I am to keep writing on this blog the way I want. I want to stay positive on this blog. It took me years to come to this POV of focusing on blessings rather than their opposites. It's another way, after all, of -- as the saying goes -- not letting the bastards get me / YOU down....

And there sure are a lot of bastards -- cruel elements -- beyond the Iron Gate.

Poetry can be many things. But here in this space, Let Poetry be a sanctuary....Let each poem remain a prayer.

If it doesn't work this way, "Mr/s Poetry" I am soooooo Gone. Let's not forget, "Mr/s Poetry" -- you want me waaaaaay more than I want you.

Don't ever let the Dark Side touch my children again, or I will hack off these wings you impaled -- IMPALED! -- on my ever-aching back and burn them burn them burn them until where once Galatea glinted with its golden light, "Galatea" will become mere rumor, ultimately evaporating, too, when the black smoke fades....

You want my Poetry? Then don't ever let the Dark Side touch my babies again. HEAR ME ROAR: Just. Don't.

WINEPOETICS' SUMMER PLEASURE POETRY CONTEST

I am off to Ojai and thus offline until Monday. Until then, I hope you consider participating in this fun August poetry love-fest:


[Pls feel free to forward]
WINEPOETICS' SUMMER PLEASURE POETRY CONTEST

Deadline: August 30, 2005
No Submission Fees
Email submissions within the body of email to GalateaTen@aol.com

Submit 1-2 poems to a "pleasure-able" poetry contest sponsored by The Chatelaine's Poetics (http://chatelaine-poet.blogspot.com) and Meritage Press (www.meritagepress.com). No restrictions on form or interpretations of "pleasure."

Members of OENOPHILES FOR POETRY (a for-profit, private organization) will judge the entrants -- probably during a meeting while they're also judging some wines (so consider that fair warning if, uh, that's something you need to be warned about). The poet whose poem most pleases the judges will receive wine (see end of this post) and the following poetry or poetry/art collections:

CATALOGUE: LIFE AS TABLEWARE by Ivy Alvarez
(Info at http://ivyai.blogspot.com/)

BRIDGEABLE SHORES: SELECTED POEMS 1961-2001 by Luis Cabalquinto
(Info at http://www.kaya.com/bs.html)

ER, UM by Garrett Caples and Hu Xin
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

PLAINWATER by Anne Carson

IDUNA by kari edwards
(Info at http://www.obooks.com/books/iduna.htm)

AFTER TAXES by Thomas Fink
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/fink2.htm)

MUSEUM OF ABSENCES by Luis H. Francia
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/museum.htm)

THE TIME AT THE END OF THIS WRITING by Paolo Javier
(Info at http://www.sendecki.com/ahadada/store/product_info.php?products_id=28)

POLES APART by Mark Young and Jukka-Pekka Kervinen
(Info at http://www.lulu.com/content/93289)

BETWEEN EARTH AND SKY by Sandy McIntosh
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/mcintosh1.htm)

WATERMARK by Jacquelyn Pope
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/pope.htm)

OPERA: POEMS 1981-2002 by Barry Schwabsky
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

[WAYS] by Barry Schwabsky and Hong Seung-Hye
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

REPRODUCTIONS OF THE EMPTY FLAGPOLE by Eileen R. Tabios
(Info at http://marshhawkpress.org/tabios1.htm)

MENAGE A TROIS WITH THE 21ST CENTURY by Eileen R. Tabios
(Info at http://www.oovrag.com/books/2004xpress.shtml)

AUTUMN SONATA: SELECTED POEMS OF GEORGE TRAKL (English versions by Daniel Simko; Introduction by Carolyn Forche)

THE ANCHORED ANGEL: SELECTED WRITINGS BY JOSE GARCIA VILLA
(Info at http://www.kaya.com/aa.html)

100 MORE JOKES FROM THE BOOK OF THE DEAD by John Yau and Archie Rand
(Info at http://meritagepress.com/meritage.htm)

as well as Meritage Press' Fall 2005 release: THE OBEDIENT DOOR, the first poetry collection by Sean Finney with drawings by Ward Schumaker.

Last but not least, if the contest winner lives in a U.S. state that allows alcohol to be shipped from California, said contest winner will also receive a bottle of fine wine chosen by Eileen Tabios, "The Chatelaine Poet" aka "Missy WinePoetics."

[Pls direct all queries to Eileen Tabios @ GalateaTen@aol.com]
[end of contest info]

*****

Until Moi returns from Ojai on Monday, Achilles will be missing me, waiting for me by the infamous IRON GATE that screens away all negative energy from Galatea:

MOI AM THE NINTH COMMANDMENT AND IT SAYETH: MOI AM "QUIRKY, LUSTFUL, PLAYFUL AND EROTIC"!

So, in wine country, several boutique-y or smaller wineries have Wine Clubs whose menbers get special discounts on purchased wines and other events. Dutch Henry Winery has one such Wine Club. Well, I'd agreed to do a poetry event for them in September (geez: what a poet will do for a free barbecue!). Well, one of their Club members just forwarded their notice about my event to me -- see "IX" below. I had no clue the Dutch Henry "Gang" knew me so well -- they must ... read my blog!!!!

So I don't know if this Club Member Info is proprietary info or not. Couldn't give a hoo-haa. It mentions me and, thus, Moi mentions it!

FROM DUTCH HENRY TO ITS CLUB MEMBERS:

Hi All,

...So let it be written. So let it be done...And so it was. High above the "Plains of Napa" (well, actually the valley floor, but "Plains of Napa" sounds cooler), stands a great mountain, a mountain called Mt. Veeder. Cloaked in a mystical fog by night and radiantly clear by day, this magical place yields an elixir known to only a few. And one of those few, who dare to grow the fruit for this mountain top nectar, is one they call "Scott". Yes, "Scott of the Gnarled Vine". And as "Scott" descended from the great mountain he carried two weathered clipboards with ten somewhat important declarations:

I. Let there be a 2004 Mt. Veeder Pinot Noir.

II. Let it be from Dutch Henry Winery.

III. Let it be more than just good, let it be "lusty".

IV. Let it be $42/bottle...$33.60/bottle after your 20% club discount.

V. Let all those who want more, have more (but order it soon, we expect to sell out)

VI. Let those who wish their usual "fix" of Chardonnay, have it at $21/bottle or $18/bottle by the case. Just say, Add the Chard "Garrett of the Sticky Keyboard" and we'll match your club shipment amount i.e., if you normally receive two bottles, we'll match that two bottle amount with Chard. If you wish more just let me know.

VII. Let us know if you have email address changes, shipping address changes and REALLY, REALLY IMPORTANT...LET US KNOW IF YOU HAVE AN UPDATED CREDIT CARD NUMBER OR EXPIRATION DATE...'cause this is one shipment you DON'T want to miss.

VIII. Let all you "Vintners Guild Members" be forewarned that the "Gathering of the Guild" Dinner on August 27th is filling up quickly and we need your RSVPs , sooooooo let us know ASAP. For those of you who are not Vintners Guild members, this is a supplementary club to our regular wine club, that gets only the Reserve Cabernet in 6 or 12 bottle shipments once a year around this time. Since we don't make enough Reserve Cab to supply our regular club, this is a way to get the Reserve to our members who want it. If you are not a Vintners Guild member and wish to be, let me know and I'll expedite your membership so that you can receive the 2002 Reserve Cab. We only have 17 memberships open, membership is very limited.

IX. Let all who read this keep September 10th open to visit Dutch Henry Winery for an evening of music performed by Gary Wm. Koehler (Garrett of the Sticky Keyboard) and quirky, lustful, playful, erotic poetry from celebrated author Eileen R. Tabios. Paired with some great BBQ and Dutch Henry wines, this complementary evening of entertainment is sure to fill up fast. Seating and BBQ limited to forty people. Sooooo, reserve your seat and place in the chow line now. Festivities
start at 6 pm.

X. Let it be known Tony says "Hi"!

May the good Lord take a likin' to ya,
The Dutch Henry Gang

PRE-OJAI RELISHES: "...REPEATED THE NAME OF GOD UNTIL THERE WAS NO SPACE FOR ANYTHING ELSE..."

The first item on my book list below, Michael Fried's The Next Bend in the Road, is not just a compulsive read but an inspirational one. Since I picked it up this afternoon, I've read through it once, and now am reading it a second time. But after each poem, I've been writing a new poem in response. Effortlessly, my poems come out as inspired by Fried's own poems, for instance Fried's prose poem, which also evokes my own rushed but heartfelt visit years back to the Alhambra:

The Alhambra

Dark limosna, mujer, por que no es en la vida nada como la pena de ser ciego en Granada
--Inscription on a wall at the Alhambra

The summer I was twenty-two I hitchhiked from Fuengirola to Granada, and spent several ardent, unforgettable days at the Alhambra. Mainly just walking up and down and seeing, or finding a secluded spot in which to read the great modern Spanish poets I had recently come to love--Jimenez, Machado, Lorca. The sun exploding continuously in a cobalt sky made the simplest nouns incandesce: hombre, caballo, sueno, naranja, muerte. Hour after hour I inhaled the exotic blossoms of the Generalife, descended with icy waters from the Sierra Nevada, contemplated in a kind of rapture the carved stucco tracery that (I later learned) everywhere intricately repeated the name of God until there was no space for anything else. Sail-shaped and starlike-colored tiles fitted together unexpectedly like noon and midnight, conquest and silence. I knew I couldn't stay forever, in fact I had to leave almost at once, but part of me, a scrap of my immortal soul, was unwilling to accept this and remained behind: a small mongrel dog, quick enough not to get caught, wandering aimlessly in shadows that are filled with light.

*****

BOOKS:
THE NEXT BEND IN THE ROAD, poems by Michael Fried

THE LIGHT AROUND THE BODY, poems by Robert Bly

BOSTON PIANO, poems by Joan Larkin

THE TIME OF VOICE: Poems 1994-1996 by Robert Kelly

LYRIC POEMS by John Keats

ONE: I BEG YOU, BE STILL, poems by Summi Kaipa

LOCAL WONDERS: SEASONS IN THE BOHEMIAN ALPS, autobiography by Ted Kooser

WHEN I WAS COOL: My Life at the Jack Kerouac School, memoir by Sam Kashner

CRAZY MELON AND CHINESE APPLE: THE POEMS OF FRANCES CHUNG, edited by Walter Lew (a re-read)

THE GREAT FAILURE: A BARTENDER, A MONK, AND MY UNLIKELY PATH TO TRUTH, memoir by Natalie Goldberg

and please not to forget the newly-released fourth e-chapbook in Ahadada's Online Chapbook Series! To wit, "Ovid's Keyholes" by Christine Kennedy & David Kennedy. Enjoy this free download!


WINES:
1989 Chateaux Cantemerle
1993 St. Hallett Old Block Shiraz
2001 Forman Cabernet
2005 GOLD
1995 Harlan (meritage blend)
1995 Beringer Nightingale Founders Reserve Barrel Fermented
1998 Beaux Freres Pinot Noir
1993 Ravenswood Monte Rosso zinfandel


READ WITHOUT RELISHING (a new category -- I also read stuff that I don't particularly "relish" so, why not add it ot the mix!):

VINTAGE FEASTING: A Vintner's Year of Fine Wines, Good Times, and Gifts from Nature's Garden, memoir by Joy Sterling
BETWEEN FRIENDS: M.F.K. Fisher And Me, memoir by Jeannette Ferrary
THE SHAPING OF A LIFE, memoir by Phyllis Tickle

MANAGING-THE-BELL-CURVE POETICS

Well, yesterday I saw the Richard Tuttle retrospective at SF Moma. I agree with much that Stephen Vincent has already said on it -- notably, the perfect "pitch" of many of Tuttle's earlier works and then how the later works seem more ... (in my, not Stephen's, word) leaden.

Those of you who have read me on Tuttle in the past know that I am a big fan of his works. So I'm partly bemused at my reaction to this exhibit. I have been trying ever since I saw the retrospective to articulate my unease, if you will, with it. I'm going to try again by suggesting that this retrospective -- as only facilitated by its comprehensiveness -- may be the WORST way possible to display Tuttle's works. It's unfortunate. I know retrospectives have their own raison et als -- the ability to look at an artist's development over time and so on...

But in this retrospective, pieces seemed to cancel each other out in terms of effecting an engagement with the viewer (this viewer, anyway). I think this has to do with how intimacy, charm and lightness are so integral (in my opinion) to a Tuttle work. So that the same piece -- or relatively few pieces -- shown can have a HUGE impact, but putting them all together within a large retrospective undercuts individual works.

Now one could argue that that holds true generally with (many) retrospectives. I certainly noticed that effect in the last Jasper Johns museum exhibit I saw (I forget venue details). But though I observed in Johns, as I did in Tuttle, how later works lost some punch, I wasn't as dismayed about it. And this, I believe, has to do with how Johns' works are less reliant on the intimate. (Not to say that engagement with Johns can't be intimate...I'm also aware that words fail here as intimacy, what I think of, too, as personal, are subjective....but let me slog on...)

There are so many implications to all this. One is how artists may reach a peak or may not be able to maintain their youthful white heat (if you will). Thing is, as practitioners of the arts, what choice do artists have if they wish to spend their whole lives at the arts but to just keep going on and on? (There is, after all, the whole matter of "process" being its own reward, though that's another story.) And so Tuttle, like Johns, and like I am still hoping to do so, just keep going on.

But continuing to make the work is different from the ways of presenting said works, right? In my opinion, a retrospective didn't diminish the presentation of individual works by Johns. But in my opinion, it did for Tuttle. It was a jarring context. I am perhaps struck by this notion also because the last exhibit in San Francisco by Tuttle was so well-contextualized (it was at a townhome gallery setting of Anthony Meier and its implied domestic references as well as the adept hangings just combined for a fabulous illumination of the Tuttles in that show).

If a huge retrospective is an inappropriate context -- the anti-ness of the works being presented -- well, do we really expect Tuttle not to do a traveling museum exhibit? I repeat that my dismay (as I suppose that is what I am feeling) is because I really felt that the retrospective context here negated intimacy, which is to say part of the individual works.

Part of the disillusion here may be that I expected Richard Tuttle, for some reason, to be aware of the contextual effect of a museum retrospective in a more pure way than I expect from most other artists. This is my problem (not his), by the way -- clearly, with my expectation I was denying Tuttle his own human nature and we are all, by being human, egotistical.

Anyway, of course it's worth seeing this exhibit. It does have historical value. There continue to be moments of transcendence. But with this retrospective, I also move the Richard Tuttle books from my bedside table ... on to the bookshelves. Sadly, I do so.

*****

The matter of presentation is an aesthetic decision. And all my natterings above also relate to something else I'd occasionally consider and which the huge Tuttle retrospective surface again: the matter of COLLECTED POEMS.

The Tuttle exhibit reveals how the concept of COLLECTED POEMS can be similar to an artist's major retrospective show. I remember Pat Rosal once commenting (half-jokingly?) on the possibility of my COLLECTED POEMS -- how it's got to be encyclopedia-like with volumes if I'm going to keep being prolific enough to turn out bricks like the 504-page ENGLISH (I may be misremembering what Pat once blogged but bear with me for a sec to make my point). My point is that I, for one, will never release such a COLLECTED POEMS. The concept doesn't interest me and all you have to do is take a look at Ted Hughes' COLLECTED to get, what, turned off?

I think the concept of COLLECTED is generally a lousy aesthetic decision. The point of COLLECTED POEMS (and artist retrospectives) is critical, academic, historical, recovery-making, canon-making, money-making, thesis-making and a whole lot of reasons -- both positive and negative. There can be value to something like COLLECTED POEMS. But I am thinking that I've yet to see a COLLECTED that advanced that poet's work in an aesthetic manner (please email me if you wish to give examples that might correct my presumption here).

(A SELECTED POEMS, on the other hand, is more intriguing. Indeed, for a prolific poet, it would be interesting to see a self-chosen SELECTED to see how something can happen from choices made out of a huge inventory.)

Btw, this is a topic close to me because of ENGLISH. I did have aesthetic considerations related to its thickness. But the thickness alone is a context that, by itself, can't help but affect its reception (e.g. it may be considered a "project" versus a group of poems and obviously, one hopes that, not withstanding the project orientation, individual poems work on their own).

Well, how to end this post? I'm not trying for a definitive conclusion on this issue. I am just trying to keep on and some of the models for dealing with the inevitable bell curve of one's progression -- and, yes, this includes the Tuttle restrospective -- are depressing.

*****

On the other hand, I am aware that I am caring much more than how I want to care on this issue (I obviously have not let go, per the Buddhist concept, of certain points ov view). Undoubtedly, due to my human frailties -- Ego, Be Gone With Ye! I say but the Void stays.

YO LEE...LORNA Y SCOTT!

Thanks to Lee Herrick for this unexpected lightning flash.

And more abecedarian hay(na)ku!!! Gracias to Lorna Dee Cervantes for hers, and to Scott Glassman who inspired this A-B-C version and continues strong with ducktail abecedarian hay(na)ku!

from the ever-beloved "Achilles and Gabriela Series"
DAWG DAYS OF SUMMER!

I'm in San Francisco as I'm headed off to Ojai tomorrow for an extended weekend break. In part, I appreciate escaping from the heat in Napa. Said heat is why Achilles, whom I naturally raised to be a gentleman, is polite enough to ask visitors if they want to share his kiddie wading pool.



The heat is also the same reason why we see the baby Gabriela often flattened out like a, uh, fur-covered pancake!



Yes, Peeps, moi German Shepherds are very relevant to the topic of poetry. I just finished sending my hay(na)ku history essay for an Afterword to the forthcoming THE FIRST HAY(NA)KU ANTHOLOGY co-edited by Mark and Jean. And did you know, as part of its history, that it also was taken up by genius Achilles? Here's his hay(na)ku offering:

HERE WE GO AGAIN
”by” Achilles

"Go
Potty!" Mama
exhorts. Sigh. Poop.

POSTSCRIPT PAINTING HAY(NA)KU

Michelle, who's helping me with posting images on my blog while I learn, kindly sent me a link that allows me now to feature Tom Fink's hay(na)ku painting the way it should look -- versus my earlier posting of it upside-down (scroll down). Actually, I like it better this way, even though Tom says the upside-down version works, too. Isn't it interesting to compare the two versions!

AY NAKU! MERON PA -- THERE'S MORE -- HAY(NA)KU!

HOT DAMN! CHECK OUT THIS HAY(NA)KU ABECEDARIAN by Scott Glassman!!!!

Born into It

A
barium chalk
defies external gravity

hostile
insurgency, june
kin looped masterfully

no
order, prism,
quandry regaling shadow

true
uteran vacancy
wildly xtatic, your

zine


*****

Scott sez, "I like the form, hybridizing it is wild."

Thank YOU, Scott!
UPDATE: Scott subsequently notes:
Alas, I left the “f” out . . . so I added this disclaimer.
the "f" was left of this hay(na)ku abecedarian, and alas, cannot be put back. apologies and regrets to "f"

It happens -- I'm sure "f" understands no "F__-off" was intended (yah, Moi couldn't resist...)

Meanwhile, Tom Fink and I just had a backchannel about moi faux pas that ended up not being so faux as regards his painting in prior post. To wit, Tom genially notes that I'd replicated the painting upside down! He sez, "You did an interesting thing with Hay(na)ku 1 that worked: you turned it up-side-down: in each canvas in the series,the middle "hay(na)ku" trio is on the left hand side, and has smallest on top and longest on the bottom. But what you did with it worked."

But, whew, he thinks it also works!

Scrambling, I noted in response -- and fortunately only made part of it up: "How interesting! But that's the best part of poems at times, when they defy linear progression, which is apt coz life ain't linear. // I know I did the same thing in many of my cubist-inspired prose poems in Reproductions -- where, theoretically, you can delete some paragraphs in certain poems or begin to read them in the beginning of end the reading before the text itself ends .... and it somehow works."

Anyhoo, ain't this all just positive energy! Thank you all for making the hay(na)ku a good time!

HAY NAKU! PAINT THAT POEM!

One of the most enjoyable aspects of the hay(na)ku is how peeps create their own variations -- from Kari Kokko's blogland phenomena "moving hay(na)ku" to the sequences and reverse sequences done so beautifully by many of you. The Hay(na)ku Blog carries a list of blogs/sites of poets who write/create hay(na)ku -- email me if I've missed your link.

Well, Thomas Fink is a painter as well as a poet -- and he's finished a series of hay(na)ku paintings! Here's the first painting from that series (all 2005 acrylic on canvases) -- note those blue "tercets"!



Thank you, Tom! I also was pleased to see the exhibit of Tom's Hay(na)ku paintings earlier this year at the English Department abode in CUNY La-Guardia. Tom has achieved his own voice in paintings -- you can see that by comparing the above with his paintings at the Marsh Hawk Press online Gallery, as well as those featured on the covers of his own poetry books, on AFTER TAXES and GOSSIP.