March of the Summer Comic-Book Movies:

There're so many comic-inspired movies coming out this summer, I need to sort them out. Let's start with a list, chronologically by release date:

1. We have a new, potentially improved, and the potential is huge here, since Ang Lee's version stunk to high hell, Hulk movie. (The Ice Storm? Sense and Sensibility? Tortilla Soup? Lee is obviously a great fit for a movie about a fucking comic book character.) The new trailer:


Release date: June 13th

2. We have Wanted, INCREDIBLY-LOOSELY based on this comic of the same name:


Release date: June 27th

3. Next is the totally stellar comic, Hellboy. This is a sequel to the 2004 release:


Release date: June 28th

4. Hancock, a seemingly peripheral character in a handful of comics, will be released on July 2nd:




5. Lastly, we also have the new Batman movie, thankfully more Miller than Burton. Don't get me wrong, I like Tim Burton, I just like my Batman a bit more serious, his villains a bit more deranged and dangerous:


Release date July 18th.

And now I have a serious concern to address, in order to stay true to the comic book fans:

Q: Comic book movies usually suck (read: are grossly commercial, highly inaccurate), how can I defend being excited by some of these trailers?

A: Well, anonymous comic book fan, the answer to that is simple: I don't care. I know, the fact that they had to use some minor, 3rd tier character to make a superhero movie with a black lead is really telling, and yes, Wanted is totally off-base and going to be just a huge load of shit. Really, Angelina Jolie is going to stand around being Angelina and there's nothing we can do to stop it. I love comics as much as the next nerd, and yes, I also was out of my mind pissed off that Arnold Schwarzenegger played Mr. Freeze, really that he got anywhere near the whole Batman thing, but there's not much we can do about it now. Actually, the worse injustice was letting Joel "Dying Young--Phantom of the Opera--St. Elmo's Fire" Schumacher anywhere near Batman. "Dying Young" for God's sake! It's the aforementioned Ang Lee syndrome: you just don't let men who believe they are capable of writing their own subtext near comic book movies: they end up believing there is no subtext and write their own terrible underpinnings that end up undermining the whole project: Batman: great, careful, complex subtext! He embodies both hero and villain! He is the Joker! He is Two Face! Classic! Hulk: full of nuclear war responsibility/free will commentary! Use the subtext already written, assholes!

But I digress, the point is comics are fun and smart and interesting and I like coupling the joy I get from reading them with the effects Hollywood has to offer. Does that forgive casting misappropriations and directors taking too much digression with story lines and characters? No, of course not. Do those digressions ruin all the excitement and discussion and fun that come out of viewing the films? Again, of course not.

Really, potentially the most exciting comic book to movie release is the furthest away, with no trailers to link to and a release date of sometime in 2009. In the meantime we can entertain ourselves by wondering, who watches the watchmen?

Of course this has potential for being terrible all over it...but c'mon, the Comedian looks awesome! Aren't you a little excited? Shed those cynical layers and disdain for the popular appropriation of your previously shunned genre and bask in the acceptance of loosely-related, commercialized versions of your heroes! It's the only way you'll ever see Night Owl decked out like Batman ready to kick more ass than his comic-book incarnation ever could (you know his comic-self is a bit eh, well, lame: his costume made him out to be more super gay bird watcher than superhero). I'm sure I'll catch hell for that last bit: I know, I know, that was the point of Watchmen, that they were un-heroes, but I always rooted for Night Owl, both of them, and wanted them to be, well, stronger characters than they were portrayed. Here is my chance to see it. And that's what comics often are all about, isn't it? They strive for the potential to transcend limitations, the imagination to overcome the boundaries of a medium, be it that of a mild-mannered alter-ego or an underrated art form.

Flamboyant Calligraphy:

FUCK: The Big Strip Tease

I cannot read Plath and resist kneeling.

Lady Lazarus

I have done it again.
One year in every ten
I manage it--

A sort of walking miracle, my skin
Bright as a Nazi lampshade,
My right foot

A paperweight,
My face a featureless, fine
Jew linen.

Peel off the napkin
O my enemy.
Do I terrify?--

The nose, the eye pits, the full set of teeth?
The sour breath
Will vanish in a day.

Soon, soon the flesh
The grave cave ate will be
At home on me

And I a smiling woman.
I am only thirty.
And like the cat I have nine times to die.

This is Number Three.
What a trash
To annihilate each decade.

What a million filaments.
The peanut-crunching crowd
Shoves in to see

Them unwrap me hand and foot--
The big strip tease.
Gentlemen, ladies

These are my hands
My knees.
I may be skin and bone,

Nevertheless, I am the same, identical woman.
The first time it happened I was ten.
It was an accident.

The second time I meant
To last it out and not come back at all.
I rocked shut

As a seashell.
They had to call and call
And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls.

Dying
Is an art, like everything else.
I do it exceptionally well.

I do it so it feels like hell.
I do it so it feels real.
I guess you could say I've a call.

It's easy enough to do it in a cell.
It's easy enough to do it and stay put.
It's the theatrical

Comeback in broad day
To the same place, the same face, the same brute
Amused shout:

'A miracle!'
That knocks me out.
There is a charge

For the eyeing of my scars, there is a charge
For the hearing of my heart--
It really goes.

And there is a charge, a very large charge
For a word or a touch
Or a bit of blood

Or a piece of my hair or my clothes.
So, so, Herr Doktor.
So, Herr Enemy.

I am your opus,
I am your valuable,
The pure gold baby

That melts to a shriek.
I turn and burn.
Do not think I underestimate your great concern.

Ash, ash--
You poke and stir.
Flesh, bone, there is nothing there--

A cake of soap,
A wedding ring,
A gold filling.

Herr God, Herr Lucifer
Beware
Beware.

Out of the ash
I rise with my red hair
And I eat men like air.



Does it not feel like the most satisfying middle finger you've ever been lucky enough to receive? I would lick her boots: she would be disgusted.

A Daydream Fulfilled:

Often times I find myself wondering, what would it look like if Jim Henson designed a chain of drag clubs in Ireland?


Ahhh. Now I know.

An Interview with Russell Edson:

Via Double Room, please enjoy this really terrific interview with Edson: I especially like the part where he refutes most everything the interviewer infers about his work. I don't think the interviewer is wrong in his conclusions about Edson's poetry (I would agree with him on a great deal of it) but I think Edson really despises when people try to position him within any sort of poetic tradition. It is a joy to watch him wiggle out of his own pinning down every time.

Because Looking for Teaching Jobs is Depressing:

I bring you a meme via the Seacoast:

1) Ten years ago I was:
Spending all my money on women and booze, spending all my time going to concerts and getting high.

2) Five things on tomorrow's to-do list:
1. price moving companies
2. revise my CV
3. enjoy my new haricut
4. go to the dentist
5. kiss Jeannine


3) Things I'd do if I were a billionaire:
I echo Emily: pay off debt, buy a house with room for a garden, donate tons to hungry people and liberals
and also: start a print journal, buy Jeannine stuff to make movies

4) Three bad habits:
1. biting my nails
2. procrastinating
3. writing in progressive tense


5) Five places I've lived:
1. Northampton, MA
2. Aurora, IL
3. Des Moines IA
4. Amherst, MA
5. North Aurora, IL


6) Six jobs I've had:
1. English Instructor
2. Writer for the Beacon News
3. Placement Exam Reader
4. Pizza Maker
5. Music Store Manager
6. Distribution Editor for a small press

From the English:

My new Grandfather:

China: Our new big brother

Thoughts?

Chris Jordan: Running the numbers

Thanks to Gina who posted this in her blog.

Thank you Denise Duhamel:

Denise on the difference between prose poetry and flash fiction:

"Prose poetry and flash fiction are kissing cousins. They are kissing on Jerry Springer, knowing they're cousins, and screaming "So what?" as the audience hisses."

--from Double Room

Please enjoy:

The wit of Amelie Gillette

Oh, and by the way:

Thank you so much to those of you who babysat me while Jeannine was gone. She is back now and we would love to see all of you as much as possible before we head back to the thick and humid Midwest. Especially those of you who I have just recently met and just hate leaving so soon into our friendship: Gabe, I'm looking in your direction...

Graduations:

It occurs to me that a lot of changes have been happening in my life lately. Some of them are listed below:

1. I am leaving Massachusetts in a month with a degree deeming me the "master" of something.

2. I have three years of teaching experience.

3. I have been receiving some pretty impressive rejection letters.

I would like to concentrate this post on #3.

So, I have received a lot of rejection in my life. I'm not complaining; I think it's good for all parties included: rejection gives those dolling them out a chance to work out their qualms with hurting others' feelings and gives them practice at saying "no" in kind and quick ways. Receiving rejection allows me to work on using it as a way to better myself, my work, and gives my ego a healthy, hard slap in the face.

I've been rejected by women, by universities, by chapbook contests, and by journals of all shapes and sizes. I've been rejected by youth basketball organizations and for grant funding. I've been rejected by Buzz Aldrin.

But let's go back to the lit mags. I've been rejected by the big dogs: The Iowa Review, Lit, The Paris Review, Northwestern Review, Tarpaulin Sky, Ploughshares, Pleadies (twice!), 3rd Bed, Mid-American Review, and Quick Fiction (every month since the beginning of the year!), plus a slew of others. But I've noticed a really pleasant trend with the rejection letters lately: I'm getting better ones! Personalized ones!

When I got rejected from Tarpaulin Sky's chapbook contest the editors wrote a note on the bottom of it stating that they, "really enjoyed my work" and "wished I would continue to submit." Me! They wanted Emily R., specifically and by name, to submit again to their magazine. This is common, a suggestion to "please submit again" as though it is them and not you that is problematic, for lit mags to print in their rejection letters. But the fact that they are hand writing some nice little bit at the end is truly, and without sarcasim, encouraging to me. Previously the letter would be something along the lines of:

Dear Emily,

While we are unable to print your work at this time because we are fresh out of ink and just love your poems minus the large parts we hate, we STRONGLY suggest you consider continual rejection by us in the future.

Love,
Every journal I've submitted work to in the last 3 years

But recently there is this trend of rejection letters with personalized notes at the bottom. Take the one I received yesterday from Mid-American Review. It was typical in its content until I saw the little note at the bottom from their poetry editor which read, "I LOVE the ending of 'Let's Make a Difference, Marie.'" It seems to me that if I wasn't close to getting something accepted, at least closer than I have been in the past with only pre-printed rejections, they wouldn't waste their time telling me that in some way something about some little part of what I wrote tripped their trigger. I just don't envision the poetry editors of major American literary journals hand writing notes to every jackass who thinks they're a poet in America; there's just not enough ink in India for that.

It may seem desperate and sad to write an entire post about rejection from lit journals, as if it is they who determine my writing's worth. Of course they do not. But in the field I presently find myself, where I am post-graduate, I need to continue to publish to have a chance of teaching again in the future. Plus, I am a writer and we have insatiable egos, the kind whose thirst is only quenched by the satisfaction of other people seeing your name in print.

In honor of MAR's compliment and my mention of "fields" in the last paragraph, below you will find my poem, "Let's Make a Difference, Marie."


Let’s Make a Difference, Marie

I read you a poem. You read out loud to me
A letter from the bank. You raise your voice.
My voice was even, disaffected, disinterested,
And held the tone of a read out loud poem.

The cat bites his feet. His feet are garden tools.
I should be cleaning. You are ripping up
The bank letter the way race cars take off.
Later, your nose is on my face; your nose is a

Troubled rose petal. You walk out of the
Room and your nose is with you but your
Cheek is left behind and resting on my
Cheek. You punch holes in papers. You

Stack and I count. We are a team. We are
Together in all of this nose trouble. It smells
in here. Who is the culprit? The cats. The piss

On the tile floor. They should be cleaning
I should be dancing. But I hate dancing
But I like what it represents: freedom, joy,
Carelessness, popularity. I have never been
Popular with those whom I would like to

Be popular. Let’s shoot for that. Let’s be
Popular with highly motivated individuals.
Everyone likes to be the best in their field.
Let’s all purchase different fields.

I hear there’s plenty of room in North
Dakota and I hear there’s a reason there’s
Plenty of room there. We can make it better.
Dance parties. I’ll hate them and call the cops.

ER

Le Sigh

I am officially done with all my work, teaching and learning, for the University of Massachusetts. More on this at a later date when I have more time to consider all this event implies. But now, I'm going to New Haven to get Jeannine!

Dear Blogger Templates,

I am unhappy with you. As someone who will frequently post poems, and a person keen on the retention of the poet's intended line breaks, why must I choose between a poem's original form and an aesthetically-pleasing blog? Look at all the white space you heap on me in the name of long-lined poems! Why am I being punished?

Aimee Nezhukumatathil is...

a new exciting find for me:

Small Murders

When Cleopatra received Antony on her cedarwood ship,
she made sure he would smell her in advance across the sea:
perfumed sails, nets sagging with rosehips and crocus
draped over her bed, her feet and hands rubbed in almond oil,
cinnamon, and henna. I knew I had you when you told me

you could not live without my scent, bought pink bottles of it,
creamy lotions, a tiny vial of parfume—one drop lasted all day.
They say Napoleon told Josephine not to bathe for two weeks
so he could savor her raw scent, but hardly any mention is ever
made of their love of violets. Her signature fragrance: a special blend

of these crushed purple blooms for wrist, cleavage, earlobe.
Some expected to discover a valuable painting inside
the locket around Napoleon’s neck when he died, but found
a powder of violet petals from his wife’s grave instead. And just
yesterday, a new boy leaned in close to whisper that he loved

the smell of my perfume, the one you handpicked years ago.
I could tell he wanted to kiss me, his breath heavy and slow
against my neck. My face lit blue from the movie screen—
I said nothing, only sat up and stared straight ahead. But
by evening’s end, I let him have it: twenty-seven kisses

on my neck, twenty-seven small murders of you. And the count
is correct, I know—each sweet press one less number to weigh
heavy in the next boy’s cupped hands. Your mark on me washed
away with each kiss. The last one so cold, so filled with mist
and tiny daggers, I already smelled blood on my hands.

Learn more about Aimee here. Read and hear her read her poems here.

"that life of helpless flight"

Tornado Crossing

They've followed me for years, the torqued
and humid pressures, the masses
of wrangling air. August afternoons
I found myself with a good pitching arm
and a first crop of acne, a boy among boys,

until they came, draining out of the wet
green belly of the sky. By the time
the sirens sounded, the air was full
of white lime and shredded yellow jerseys,
and I was weightless, whirling over the houses
of my fathers. It's been like this ever since:

lovers have lost me in the air, and great poems,
whole treatises of reason, have been ripped
from my hands to rain out over, I don't know,
Kansas, maybe. More than once
I've found myself turning to say something
beautiful, then suddenly looking far down

at someone waving a bewildered goodbye.
This is how I've moved through all my lives,
whipped up and torn apart, rained down
and remade, different clothes, new skin.
Only my voice has remained the same.
Sometimes I'd go to sleep and wake up

in a different timezone, on a rooftop
in North Dakota, Wisconsin, Nebraska,
anywhere a tornado has ever been. I ran
for days and years, deep into deserts
and forests, into places where, by virtue

of physics, tornadoes should not exist.
For awhile in California I was whirlwind-free,
and that life of helpless flight became
a running joke. By my front door

I posted a sign that read, "Tornado Crossing,"
in thick black letters. My neighbors laughed,
their perfect faces crinkling like plastic wrap.
The sign was levity and wit until the green sky,
the sirens, the perfect identical houses aloft

like stucco zeppelins, their windows popping
like balloons. And I woke to this life,
a displaced citizen, alone in a lonely city.
So far the weather is beautiful, all sun
and careless breezes, though lately I wake

with my ears popping and my tears staining
the ceiling. And just yesterday, down the street,
it rained baseballs. You should have seen it.
The damage was immense.

This Preston Mark Stone poem was taken from the lit journal Gravity. You can find lots more of Preston's work here.

I couldn't have said it better:

Oh, if you visit one blog today, please read Dan Savage's blog on Kay Barnes. The phrase, "black gay abortionists drunk on champagne" should be a part of everyone's day. And, for Christ and crackers, the commercial made me laugh out loud, for real, not LOL, in front of my computer.

A good reminder from Post Secret

There's nothing wrong with making a million dollars, there's just something wrong with keeping all of it.

Every Friday that I get paid, such as today, I give 10% of my gross (pre-tax) income to charity. I used to give money here and there to charities when I thought of it. That is not enough. But I thought I would miss the 10%. I thought, I'm a poor grad student, that maybe I should give 20 bucks a week or something like that. But I tried it, the 10%, and I don't miss it: I can pay my bills, I can buy groceries, I can go out on the weekends. I don't really feel it, so today I'm going to start giving 15% and see what happens.

I'm not writing about this to make myself feel good, or to make you feel bad for not giving. Well, that second part is kind of a lie. I am writing about this so you will think about giving up a percentage of your wages to charity. I don't want to guilt you into it, but if guilt makes you do it, then I am okay with that. I want you to see that's it's possible, that you don't have to be rich to give.

I don't think it matters who gets it: there is the argument that we should fix problems in our own country before we help others. Does anyone of you think all of the problems in America will be fixed in their lifetime? Will that be happening soon so you can justify helping people other than Americans, or justify waiting until they're all that's left to help?

I'm not saying it's bad to help starving Americans, I'm saying that I can't look at the pictures of people in China, in Burma, in India, and not give them money. Check out either of the two charities listed on my link list: they're reputable and I usually give to them. Want to find your own charity to give to? Check out Charity Navigator to give to something you're into. Too lazy? That's okay; enjoy the musical stylings of Sarah McLachlan and she can give you options too.

I see no reason to mince words here: If you are in an economic position to read my blog, you have the ability to give, nay the moral duty to give. Starvation and poverty are not only things we have the ability to change, but as the economically elite (globally speaking) we have the duty to help. This may sound preachy: I don't give a rusty fuck. Get off your ass and donate.

Some honesty in politics:

Go see the rest of the campaigns the candidates wish they could run here.

This creation story is much more plausible...

from The New Yorker
September 26, 2005
Shouts and Murmurs: Intelligent Design
by Paul Rudnick



Day No. 1:

And the Lord God said, “Let there be light,” and lo, there was light. But then the Lord God said, “Wait, what if I make it a sort of rosy, sunset-at-the-beach, filtered half-light, so that everything else I design will look younger?”

“I’m loving that,” said Buddha. “It’s new.”

“You should design a restaurant,” added Allah.


Day No. 2:

“Today,” the Lord God said, “let’s do land.” And lo, there was land.

“Well, it’s really not just land,” noted Vishnu. “You’ve got mountains and valleys and—is that lava?”

“It’s not a single statement,” said the Lord God. “I want it to say, ‘Yes, this is land, but it’s not afraid to ooze.’ ”

“It’s really a backdrop, a sort of blank canvas,” put in Apollo. “It’s, like, minimalism, only with scale.”

“But—brown?” Buddha asked.

“Brown with infinite variations,” said the Lord God. “Taupe, ochre, burnt umber—they’re called earth tones.”

“I wasn’t criticizing,” said Buddha. “I was just noticing.”


Day No. 3:

“Just to make everyone happy,” said the Lord God, “today I’m thinking oceans, for contrast.”

“It’s wet, it’s deep, yet it’s frothy; it’s design without dogma,” said Buddha, approvingly.

“Now, there’s movement,” agreed Allah. “It’s not just ‘Hi, I’m a planet—no splashing.’”

“But are those ice caps?” inquired Thor. “Is this a coherent vision, or a highball?”

“I can do ice caps if I want to,” sniffed the Lord God.

“It’s about a mood,” said the Angel Moroni, supportively.

“Thank you,” said the Lord God.


Day No. 4:

“One word,” said the Lord God. “Landscaping. But I want it to look natural, as if it all somehow just happened.”

“Do rain forests,” suggested a primitive tribal god, who was known only as a clicking noise.

“Rain forests here,” decreed the Lord God. “And deserts there. For a spa feeling.”

“Which is fresh, but let’s give it glow,” said Buddha. “Polished stones and bamboo, with a soothing trickle of something.”

“I know where you’re going,” said the Lord God. “But why am I seeing scented candles and a signature body wash?”

“Shut up,” said Buddha.

“You shut up,” said the Lord God.

“It’s all about the mix,” Allah declared in a calming voice. “Now let’s look at some swatches.”


Day No. 5:

“I’d like to design some creatures of the sea,” the Lord God said. “Sleek but not slick.”

“Yes, yes, and more yes—it’s a total gills moment,” said Apollo. “But what if you added wings?”

“Fussy,” whispered Buddha to Zeus. “Why not epaulets and a sash?”

“Legs,” said Allah. “Now let’s do legs.”

“Are we already doing dining-room tables?” asked the Lord God, confused.

“No, design some creatures with legs,” said Allah. So the Lord God, nodding, designed an ostrich.

“First draft,” everyone agreed, and so the Lord God designed an alligator.

“There’s gonna be a waiting list,” Zeus murmured appreciatively.

“Now do puppies!” pleaded Vishnu. “And kitties!”

“Ooooo!” all the gods cooed. Then, feeling a bit embarrassed, Zeus ventured, “Design something more practical, like a horse or a mule.”

“What about a koala?” asked the Lord God.

“Much better,” Zeus declared, cuddling the furry little animal. “I’m going to call him Buttons.”


Day No. 6:

“Today I’m really going out there,” said the Lord God. “And I know it won’t be popular at first, and you’re all gonna be saying, ‘Earth to Lord God,’ but in a few million years it’s going to be timeless. I’m going to design a man.”

And everyone looked upon the man that the Lord God designed.

“It has your eyes,” Zeus told the Lord God.

“Does it stack?” inquired Allah.

“It has a naïve, folk-artsy, I-made-it-myself vibe,” said Buddha. The Inca sun god, however, only scoffed. “Been there. Evolution,” he said. “It’s called a shaved monkey.”

“I like it,” protested Buddha. “But it can’t work a strapless dress.” Everyone agreed on this point, so the Lord God announced, “Well, what if I give it nice round breasts and lose the penis?”

“Yes,” the gods said immediately.

“Now it’s intelligent,” said Aphrodite.

“But what if I made it blond?” giggled the Lord God.

“And what if I made you a booming offscreen voice in a lot of bad movies?” asked Aphrodite.


Day No. 7:

“You know, I’m really feeling good about this whole intelligent-design deal,” said the Lord God. “But do you think that I could redo it, keeping the quality but making it at a price point we could all live with?”

“I’m not sure,” said Buddha. “You mean, what if you designed a really basic, no-frills planet? Like, do the man and the woman really need all those toes?”

“Hello!” said the Lord God. “Clean lines, no moving parts, functional but fun. Three bright, happy, wash ’n’ go colors.”

“Swedish meets Japanese, with maybe a Platinum Collector’s Edition for the geeks,” Buddha decided.

“Done,” said the Lord God. “Now let’s start thinking about Pluto. What if everything on Pluto was brushed aluminum?”

“You mean, let’s do Neptune again?” said Buddha.

Probing

I went to a dentist appointment, which normally is really uneventful, and this one mostly was too. But I met this really nice old guy (83, by his own admission) who used to be a carpenter and now is retired and runs a blacksmith museum in Westhampton...who wants to go check it out with me?

Also, this morning was the first time I had to fill out a medical form and check the cancer box. It was weird, I saw the box and my pen hovered over it for a minute...I was briefly unsure of whether or not to check it.

I thought, I'm young, people like me don't get cancer, I have never been an unhealthy person. But I did have cancer and a hysterectomy and sometimes, although I spent months recovering and am still not 100%, the whole ordeal seems unreal to me. In my mind sometimes it is as though I had something bad, something like cancer, but not cancer, because people like me, no I, I don't get cancer. But I did so I checked the box and felt like someone else sitting in that dentist office for a few minutes. I wasn't sad, just a bit alienated from my body and the identity I claimed I had of my self for the better part of three decades.

I am now someone who had cancer...I never think about it because I am confident I'm cured (although the Cancer society jerks will never call it that, I'll only always be in remission). Even as I type this, it's like I'm writing a story about someone I made up for a poem. But I'm pretty sure there was at least part of me in that office this morning, and that part of me used to have cancer, this really bad and well-known disease that I hear people unlike me talk about on t.v.

Like I said, this is not something that made me unhappy or scared, it was just a realization I didn't know I hadn't made until this morning. Or a realization I didn't know existed for me until this morning. It's strange to discover you aren't who you think you are, that this new label applies to you that you were so culturally familiar with but so personally foreign to...which is kinda like cancer anyway: cells thought of as foreign troublemakerers that are actually cells of your own body turning on you. And how weird is it that I began writing in the second person here? As though I still, after the diagnosis and the surgery and the recovery and the box-checking, don't believe it.

*Sigh*

I really miss Jeannine right now.

Some News:

1. I finished making my first chapbook: 8 little poems in a little orange book. There are only ten of them. There will be another run with some great cover art from one of my comic book students.

2. I passed my defense.

What is today, again?

Mother's day! Don't forget to call all the moms you know and thank them for squeezing babies out of holes no bigger than say, oh, your father's fist.

And go here for some neat M-Day art!

A Fortenight Date?

Hey you Northampton folks:

So, Jeannine is going out of town to Eastern Europe (I know, we're all jealous) for two solid weeks starting tonight. Any of you wanna keep me company while she's gone? I don't want this to sound like I only wanna hang out with you to occupy me while Jeannine's not here; it just coincides with the end of the semester and when I have time to do fun stuff: go to movies, play pool, do trivia, sit in silence and read (ok, maybe that last one's only a fun joint activity for me and my poet and fiction friends).

So call me! Let's hang out!

What an Exciting Morning!

I have had a really nice morning after a terrible two days: I was worrying about my defense, sleepless nights and all, but have decided to not worry about it, because I will not perish from it and even if I fail (worst and really, most unlikely scenario), I can always come back next semester and do it again; it's not like I have job offers dependent on my degree. Plus, I would get to see my friends!

So, this morning! I was looking at my friend Jackie's pictures on myspace, and came across a picture of Jackie in a bathroom somewhere in Chicago. In the foreground there is a flyer for a flash fiction lit mag called The Green Flash. This is exciting to me, a tiny new lit mag in Chicago all about flash fiction! For those of you who don't know, most of my manuscript was prose poems, which are just the more disjointed sibling of flash fiction. So I google The Green Flash and the only thing that comes up is a link to a blurb about a release party on the north side, but it also contains the names of the editors, Molly Tolsky and Ryan Duke.

It is at this point it occurs to me that I have come across Molly before. I recently read one of her stories in the online lit journal Pindeldyboz called "Stub." So this morning I sent Molly an email (her address is on the Pindeldyboz site) telling her about how I found her, her writing, The Green Flash. This is kinda neat and a nice thing to happen to me today, after all my worrying about my defense, because oh, I've just been really doubting my writing abilities and wondering how I might go about finding some writer friends when I move home. Molly may never answer my email, but it gave me hope when I needed it, and that is all I ask for, a little thread to hold onto when I'm down.

It also makes me rethink giving up on prose poetry. I haven't written any since finishing my manuscript, and this experience makes me want to revisit the form again. Not that I had given up on it forever, I just sorta turned my back on it after the whole cancer thing, like I couldn't look at prose poetry because that was all I was writing when I found out. It might be too early to go back in there, but really, it's not prose poetry's fault: it didn't give me cancer!

In any event, I've had a nice morning so here is a recent pic and a fun poem I wrote last week for my cat Violet who turned three on April 28th. Happy birthday Mrs. Beauregard!

Of Lost Whiskers and Fortuitous Assignations

Yesterday was my cat’s birthday.
All cats have questionable births:
On a lawn chair, under a bridge,

During the playoffs. Violet born
Behind a garbage can, her feral
Yowls interrupted by interactions

Of animals taller than her busy looking
For a place to resemble the nonchalant
Or drink coffee. Violet released from

The womb still in her amniotic sac—
The rough pressure of her mother’s
Tongue flushed her out, started

Respiration for a matted gelled mass.
I watch Violet lap water into her mouth,
Think of that thin membrane between

Water and air, between the harsh nature of
Survival and the tender love we ascribe to it.