The Fat's On Everybody's Lips

The Professionalization of Poetry...It's Okay

2009-04-06T20:28:00.000-07:00

I’ve thought a little bit more about Mattix’s article “Poetry and Subsidies: Is Materialism Ruining Creativity?” Although Mattix seems to be asserting, along with several sub-points (jabs at the avant-garde, the need for riskier poetry that is against the commercialization of art, etc., etc.), that: poetry is waning because there’s too much money thrown at mediocre poets through prizes, subsidies, grants, lectureships, and professorships.

After re-reading the article it feels like an anti-academic criticism; after all who funds the majority of the prizes, subsidies, grants, lectureships, and professorships: universities and well-funded non-profit arts organizations who often have some ties to universities. I think what Mattix is talking about is the professionalization of poetry, which essentially means that the proliferation of creative writing programs necessitates professional poets (who of course have other skills…namely teaching lit, comp, etc.).

So, a poet who loves writing and has a passion for poetry and/or literature might postulate “I should teach” and off they go to build a resume to achieve that objective. But how is this any different than any other profession. I work for a bank. How does one move up in the bank:

• They take an entry level position selling residential loans or running a depository branch, get really good at selling residential loans, etc., etc.: top producer, awards dinners, plaques in office, etc.
• They get promoted to lower level management
• Go back to school and get MBA
• They get promoted to mid-level management: more accolades, awards dinners, more responsibility and more visibility
• And they eventually get promoted to senior level management and somewhere along they way they might have to get a little more education to sweeten the deal

The prizes, subsidies, grants, lectureships, and professorships help build a prospective “professional poets” resume along with, of course, publications. I don’t think “contemporary poetry works like a Ponzi scheme operated by the academic world” (sorry BJ) because this kind of “resume building” is prevalent in any occupation. So, “resume building” is expected for those that want to teach creative writing in academia and I still have faith that the prizes, grants, and publications are available to academic and non-academic alike because quality poetry will always rise to the surface whether an MFA student or teacher poet or established god/goddess of poetry or a poet outside academia is writing the poetry. My only concerns are:

A. That poetry becomes elitist: that bad poets make all the decisions or non-poets make all the decisions regarding prizes, grants, publications, funding of creative writing programs.
B. That those poets operating within “the hallowed walls” (sorry if this offends anybody…I’m not anti-academic) of academia are writing poetry for resume building as opposed to writing because they must.
I think to some degree the surge in small, grassroots presses helps counter concern A. There are many small presses that are producing wonderful work and two that have supremely impressed me are Black Ocean Press and Octopus Books. For example, I am not at all stylistically similar to Eric Baus but his work challenges me, inspires me, makes me feel good after I read it. I’ve read The To Sound twice and finished Tuned Droves about a month ago. And as BJ puts it, there are plenty of poets writing from outside academia to give proper balance to contemporary poetry:

There are scads of poets living and working outside of academia, and these voices are quickly becoming the voices recognized as contemporary poetry. They are voices that aren't being called upon to fill job requirements, in fact, they are voices that exist despite job requirements, motivated by no other desire than to make poetry that people want to read, or, in the very least, that we want to read again later. They are voices that don't have to exist, but do…

I don’t know if they are being “recognized as contemporary poetry” but they are being recognized and are evolving into a more essential component of contemporary poetry. And I like the idea of being “motivated by no other desire than to make poetry…” This is really what I’m after…to make poetry and equally important to ingest poetry (metaphorically of course…unless said poetry is chocolate in nature or Starburst jelly beans in taste).

So, in conclusion for tonight, I don't believe materialism is ruining poetry.

Making It Commercially

2009-04-05T19:47:00.000-07:00

This post was going to be a response to John Gallaher's post about an article by Micah Mattix's article Poetry and Subsidies which was partially in response to Tom Bethell's article in The American Spectator. But my response got a little to big for its britches so, since I haven't posted in a while, I decided to post my response here.

I honestly think, if Mattix is interpreting Bethell accurately, that Bethell is off kilter…as is Mattix. Sure prizes, subsidies, grants, lectureships and professorships may be bureaucratic and careerist in nature but who cares. Is the world that bad off having more poetry in it due to the prizes, subsidies, etc.?

Micah Mattix’s suggestion that there’s a possibility of “making it commercially” in poetry is pretty ridiculous. With the exception of a few poets who have achieved a little “commercial” success such as Ai, Billy Collins, Mary Oliver, Maya Angelou, poetry is not a profitable endeavor and thus using the phrase “making it commercially” feels asinine.

Unfortunately, like many contemporary arguments about the “decline of poetry,” I feel that Mattix assumes that poetry “is” waning before proving it “is” waning, which is to say, “poetry is waning” seems like one of his premises, while at the same time being his conclusion. This is probably confusing but suffice it to say, I am not convinced that poetry is in fact waning.

If the prizes, subsidies, grants, lectureships and professorships were reduced to reduce the amount of mediocre poetry wouldn’t this be similar to what Collins jokingly suggested a few years back: that the NEA pay poets to not write to reduce the mediocrity in contemporary poetry. This, in my opinion, seems to lead to elitism.

I like Mattix’s conclusion though, that critics need to do a better job of finding good poetry.

Ultimately though, I say who cares. These kinds of things tend to take care of themselves. Time causes the dross to rise to the surface and eventually it’s scraped off. But of course this may be too simplistic a conclusion and doesn’t mean that I believe thoughtful dialogue about the state of contemporary poetry shouldn’t exist.

Out on a Friday Night

2009-02-20T18:30:00.000-08:00

Megan, I, and the boys went out to Minsky's Pizza tonight. It has been a long week and neither Megan nor I were up to going through the normal routine of preparing dinner. It was a pleasant little family dinner minus, of course, sitting right next to the entrance.

In a little bit Megan and I are going to watch The Duchess. We tried to watch Appaloosa earlier this week but could not watch all of it. I don't think it was a bad movie; it kind of reminded me of old school westerns: very plain, straightforward dialogue, clear bad guys and good guys, a woman who vies for the affection of the rugged gun slinger. But I kind of got bored which was too bad since I love Ed Harris, Jeremy Irons, and Viggo Mortensen.

Oh, and before we watch The Duchess I'm going to run out and get fixings for Cosmopolitans. No, I don't drink Cosmopolitans but Megan likes them and she's in the mood for martinis. So, I'm going to attempt to make my first martinis tonight. It could get ugly.

I'm getting three Tupperware containers full of encyclopedias tomorrow. And my parents are visiting which should be fun. And I'm going to the Apple store in "The Plaza" or "The Plaaaaza" to price a new computer.

David Kirby

2009-02-19T19:34:00.000-08:00

I went to David Kirby's reading at the Kansas City Art Institute tonight. There was a fairly large turnout...mostly art institute students through. I've read Kirby's work before and it is littered with obscure (and less obscure) literary and pop culture references. He has a very stream of consciousness style which can be difficult to follow but very rewarding if you stick with the poem. But hearing him read the poems brought the poems I've read to life and added an even greater texture to the language, narrative, etc. David Kirby appears to love language, narrative, story-telling, pop culture, literature, and he has tones of fun with each of them as he weaves in-and-out of different threads within the same poem. It was fun listening to him read. The reading made me appreciate his work a whole lot more...so much so that I bought his most recent book: The House on Boulevard Street: New and Selected Poems (LSU press).

The Party Monkey

2009-02-17T20:11:00.000-08:00

Today I felt a little out of sorts. I still had "the party monkey" on my back as one of my co-workers put it. Although there are some naysayers regarding AWP I had an excellent time. My top 10 highlights:

Hanging out with BJ and MD drinking beer, single malt McCallan's, and eating good food.
Buying John Gallaher's Map of the Folded World (I also bought Heather Derr-Smith's The Bride Minaret and Ashley Capps' Mistaking the Sea for Green Fields from the University of Akron Press and look forward to reading all three...thanks to Mary Biddinger for her recommendations on Derr-Smith and Capps).
Walking 20 blocks in the wrong direction attempting to find the Rabbit Lights Live reading at New Wave Coffee, walking 20 blocks back to the Empty Bottle, and then another 6-8 blocks before BJ, MD, and I gave up. It was an adventure.
Drinking beers with BJ and MD at Blueline after walking around for 2 hours after attending No Thousands: A Small Press Reading and attempting to find the Rabbit Lights Live reading.
The Poets of American Hybrid reading: Peter Gizzi was amazing.
The More Than a Collection: Imagining and Realizing Thematic Poetry Projects panel. Oliver De La Paz, Jake Adam York, and Sean Nevin were great. This was one of the most professional, articulate, and helpful panels I've been to at AWP. Great job...my favorites were ODLP, JAY, and SN.
Hanging out with BJ, MD, FK, etc. at BJ's place in Hyde Park which happens to be 2 blocks from where Barack Obama lives and he happened to be at home for the weekend which meant that the street leading to his house had no parked cars. That's a little tid bit that made me feel warm and fuzzy...but that could have been the Knob Creek.
Buying Brandi Homan's Hard Reds: it feels good to know there's a published Marshalltown poet or poet from Marshalltown.
The University of Missouri-Kansas City/New Letters reading featuring Robert Stewart, Michael Pritchett, Christie Hodgen, Hadara Bar-Nadav, and Michelle Boisseau. Christie's story kicked ass as did Michelle's and Hadara's poetry. The whole thing was really great!!! Thanks for hanging in there BJ and MD.
Falling asleep at 2:30 AM on Friday night after a day and night of drinking McCallan's single malt and beer. I snored while BJ and MD chatted away until 4:30 AM. O, AWP.

Thanks for the great time BJ and MD. And thanks for having us over to your apartment Anne. Also, it was great seeing Friedrich again.

Misery

2009-02-06T17:41:00.000-08:00

Check out your misery index. It looks like we're mildly miserable in Missouri. Although Kansas City is ranked better than Chicago. Kansas City is ranked 92nd; whereas Chicago is ranked 159th. But of course this is not a joking matter...things kind of stink right now and the media is fanning the flames everyday.

Tonight is going to entail the following:

Watch a little Lord of the Rings with Elijah and Gavin
After Elijah and Gavin go to bed I'm going to drink a few beers
I am going to drink a few more beers and either watch The Duchess or The Namesake with Megan

I finished another rough draft this morning: "After Watching Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" which of course is based partially on the incidents after watching Nightmare at 20,000 Feet with Elijah and Gavin.

Four days left. I'm going shopping this weekend. Guess what I'm shopping for?

2009 Poetry Tournament, Eastern Region Round 2 continued

2009-02-05T05:08:00.000-08:00

Here's Eastern Region Round 2 for Group 2:

Jean-Paul Pecqueur, "Truth"
vs.
Mark Bibbins, "Just Yesterday"

WINNER: Jean-Paul Pecqueur, "Truth" - this is somehwhat of an upset because I've read Bibbins before and thoroughly enjoyed sky lounge but upon reading "Truth" a third time in the last week I saw thing I did not see in previous readings.

* * *

Nancy Krygowski, "This Loss, Any:"
vs.
A. Loudermilk, "Daring Love"

WINNER: Nancy Krygowski, "This Loss, Any:"

* * *

So here's the final 4 for the Eastern Region:

Joan Houlihan, "Squall Line"
vs.
Joshua Beckman, "Lament for the Death of a Bullfighter"

and

Jean-Paul Pecqueur, "Truth"
vs.
Nancy Krygowski, "This Loss, Any:"

Ahhh, the things I do to pass the time. I think I might do a post-AWP poetry tournament involving all the poetry books I purchase at AWP.

2009 Poetry Tournament, Eastern Region Round 2

2009-02-04T18:53:00.000-08:00

Here's Round 2 for Group 1 from the Eastern Region bracket:

Joan Houlihan, "Squall Line"
vs.
Jim Daniels, "The Dark Planet"

WINNER: Joan Houlihan, "Squall Line"

* * *

Joshua Beckman, "Lament for the Death of a Bullfighter"
vs.
Anthony McCann, "Father of Noise Ceremony"

WINNER: Joshua Beckman, "Lament for the Death of a Bullfighter" - I think BJ's right: Beckman is going to be hard to beat. His poem is pretty awesome.

* * *

Tomorrow we will move on to Round 2 for Group 2 from the Eastern Region bracket and then we will be down to our final four. The poets competing in Round 2 for Group 2 are:

Nancy Krygowski, "This Loss, Any:"
vs.
A. Loudermilk, "Daring Love"

and

Mark Bibbins, "Just Yesterday"
vs.
Jean-Paul Pecqueur, "Truth"

I can't believe I just used the words "poet" and "competing" in the same sentence because I'm idealistic and don't want to believe poet's would ever compete amongst one another. Of course, my idealism is bull shit because whether poets like to admit it or not they either overtly and secretly compete with each other quite frequently.

I keep referring this poetry tournament thing as the "Eastern Region bracket" because all of these poets were or still are from the east coast: Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, etc. Plus, I like to think of this as my own little private "NCAA-like" tournament only with poetry.

Tuesday Tid Bits

2009-02-03T19:05:00.000-08:00

This is the dialogue between my wife, Brayden (my youngest son who is turning 3 in 19 days), and I the other night (keep in mind my son has never said "I love you" to either of us because he's stubborn):

MEGAN: I love Brayden. Who do you love Brayden?

BRAYDEN: I love mommy.

MEGAN: No, I love Brayden.

BRAYDEN: I love mommy.

ME: What about me? I love Brayden. Do you love me Brayden?

BRAYDEN (taking his eyes off of me and slowly turning his gaze towards Megan): I love mommy.

MEGAN: Don't you love daddy?

BRAYDEN: I love mommy.

ME: C'mon. I love Brayden. I love Brayden. What do you say Brayden? Do you love daddy?

BRAYDEN: I love Brayden.

Megan laughed. Brayden laughed. I cried. No, actually I laughed too.

* * *

My other son Gavin (7 years old) said two hilarious things during our farkle game tonight:

He told Megan and I that when he visits are tombs some day that he's going to put chicken on my tomb because I eat meat and vegtables on Megan's tomb because she's a vegetarian.
He also said that his stuffed otter, which he has called baby for years, is the son of God and that his baby is just waiting to take God's place when he wants a break.

* * *

BJ made me aware of this awesome off-site reading during AWP:

6:00PM-9:00PMThe Burning Chair Readings: Ahsahta Press & Typo
Location: The Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western Ave
Cost: Cover charge TBD by venue
Website: http://www.typomag.com/burningchair
Poetry readings from Carrie Olivia Adams, Ben Doller, Kathleen Jesme, Forrest Gander, Brenda Hillman, Alex Lemon, Barbara Maloutas, Rusty Morrison, G.E. Patterson, Marvyn Petrucci, & Stephanie Strickland.

I'm familiar with Carrie Olivia Adams, Forrest Gander, Brenda Hilman, and Alex Lemon. And I look forward to familiarizing myself with the rest.

* * *

Farkle Standings
Gavin - 19
Jon - 18
Elijah - 16
Megan - 13

2009 Poetry Tournament, Eastern Region Round 1 continued

2009-02-02T04:49:00.001-08:00

Here's Group 2 for round 1:

Jeffrey Levine, "Blisses"
vs.
Nancy Krygowski, "This Loss, Any:"

WINNER: Nancy Krygowski, "This Loss, Any:"

* * *

A. Loudermilk, "Daring Love"
vs.
Alessandra Lynch, "Birthday"

WINNER: A. Loudermilk, "Daring Love"

* * *
Sarah Hannah, "The Garden As She Left It"
vs.
Mark Bibbins, "Just Yesterday"

WINNER: Mark Bibbins, "Just Yesterday" - Mark Bibbins is pretty freaking awesome. Reading this poem makes me want to read sky lounge again. And since I've read sky lounge before Sarah Hannah's poem was probably at a disadvantage since I haven't read Inflorescence before. You could call it bad refereeing.

* * *

Jean-Paul Pecqueur, "Truth"
vs.
Aimee Nezhukumatathil, "One Bit"

WINNER: Jean-Paul Pecqueur, "Truth" - I can't really say anything about this one. This was an upset. I loved Aimee Nezhukumatathil's At the Drive-In Valcano and thought she'd win this won. But alas, Jean-Paul is the winner.

* * *

On to round 2.

2009 Poetry Tournament, Eastern Region Round 1

2009-02-01T12:28:00.000-08:00

You could call this Round 1, Group 1 since it's only the first 8 poets. But since I'm a little short of time I'll have to have Round 1, Group 2 tomorrow or Tuesday. But here you go (I hope this captures the essence of Schomburg's fun poetry tournament exercise):

* * *

Ethan Paquin, "[people are/wherever there's clouds/starry curvature]"

vs.
Joshua Beckman, "Lament for the Death of a Bullfighter"

WINNER: Joshua Beckman, "Lament for the Death of a Bullfighter"

* * *

Anthony McCann, "Father of Noise Ceremony"
vs.
Ellen Dudley, "The Bats"

WINNER: Anthony McCann, "Father of Noise Ceremony" - it was close but McCann nailed the ending like a gymnast nailing a dismount from a pommel horse.

* * *

Rod Smith, "the egret says..."
vs.
Joan Houlihan, "Squall Line"

WINNER: Joan Houlihan, "Squall Line"

* * *

Susan Grimm, "Green Wave"
vs.
Jim Daniels, "The Dark Planet"

WINNER: Jim Daniels, "The Dark Planet" - this one was close as well but its hard to compete with Daniels' ending:

"A smudge at memory's edge: love's
tender silence. Footsteps." (ll. 9-10)

I really love the simple yet stark language alongside the haunting footsteps.

* * *

So, the forthcoming Round 2 for the first group will be:

Joshua Beckman, "Lament for the Death of a Bullfighter"
vs.
Anthony McCann, "Father of Noise Ceremony"

and

Joan Houlihan, "Squall Line"
vs.
Jim Daniels, "The Dark Planet"

The host city will be Syracuse, NY for Group 1 (this is a NCAA hoops reference).

2009 Poetry Tournament

2009-01-31T08:19:00.000-08:00

A few months ago Zachary Schomburg posted a poetry tournament. I can't find the post; perhaps BJ can help. The concept was simple: set up a bracket (probably 16) of contemporary poets from your personal library, read the first (i.e., opening) poem from their book and which ever poem is best moves on until a champion is crowned. I hope this is an adequate description.

I have chosen poets from the east coast for my first poetry tournament. So, if this were a "March madness" type poetry tournament this would be the Eastern Region bracket.

This will be my distraction for the next 1 1/2 weeks so that I'm not distracted by the looming trip to AWP in Chicago when, as Marc and I talked about today, us adults get to go on vacation and indulge by staying up late and drinking lots of beer.

Here are the poets from the Eastern Regional bracket and the corresponding book that the first poem will come from:

Ethan Paquin, The Violence
Joshua Beckman, Things Are Happening
Anthony McCann, Father of Noise
Ellen Dudley, The Geographic Cure
Rod Smith, Deed
Susan Grimm, Lake Erie Blue
Jeffrey Levine, Mortal, Everlasting
Nancy Krygowski, Velocity
Alessandra Lynch, it was a terrible cloud at twilight.
A. Loudermilk, Strange Valentine
Sarah Hannah, Inflorescence
Aimee Nezhukumatathil, miracle fruit
Jim Daniels, Night with Drive-By Shooting Stars
Joan Houlihan, The Mending Worm
Mark Bibbins, sky lounge
Jean-Paul Pecqueur, The Case Against Happiness

I will post the first round tomorrow (hopefully...time permitting). This ought to fun, entertaining, and something nerdy to pass the time.

My Friday Night

2009-01-30T20:11:00.001-08:00

My sons (Gavin and Elijah) are in Boy Scouts. So, this is what I did on Friday night:

Elijah's Boa constrictor pine wood race car.

Gavin's car.

Gavin, very excited about his prospects of being the Pinewood Derby champion.

Sibling Rivalry: oddly enough, Elijah and Gavin had to square off against each other in their first race. It was a random drawing to see who went against who.

Gavin and Elijah (left to right) patiently wait for the race results.

Elijah hoping for the best.

Elijah getting excited as the cars are released while his friend Zach sways in a zombie like trance.

Elijah's car at the end of the track after beating Gavin's car. Elijah was 4-0 against Gavin, which didn't make for a very happy Gavin.

But Gavin was still very gracious in defeat. Although he won all the races that were not against his brother. Also, our sons were the only siblings to race against each other even though there were at least 4 families with multiple boys in Boy Scouts. Very weird.

The Pinewood Derby is an annual event put on by the Boy Scouts. It was a new experience for me because I didn't do Boy Scouts growing up, and quite honestly probably wouldn't have signed my boys up for it if they hadn't asked to be in Boy Scouts. Their friends are in Boy Scouts so I couldn't really deny them.

We didn't get home until 9:30 pm. So, we ended up picking up Culver's because it started at 6 pm and we didn't have time for dinner before the Pinewood Derby started.

Naysayers, etc.

2009-01-29T18:40:00.000-08:00

Megan and I are back into Battlestar Galactica. We're plowing through season 4. I love it! The narrative is dark, complex, mesmerizing, unique, haunting, etc., etc. I think it's one of the most well-written Science Fiction television shows of all time, which isn't saying much I suppose since there's not much competition in the science fiction category. So, I'll extend it by saying I think it's one of the most well-written 1 hour dramas ever.

*
Farkle Standings
Gavin - 19
Jon - 18
Elijah - 16
Megan - 12

Gavin is still the king and Megan is in a bit of a slump.

The AWP Itch

2009-01-28T19:24:00.001-08:00

I'm getting the AWP itch. I haven't had much time to think about AWP because I've been busy at work. It dawned on me a few days ago that AWP is only a week and half away. Last year I came back with so much loot (mostly books and journals) that I had to pay Northwest Airlines $25 because my suitcase was over 55 lbs. By the time I got home the zipper broke on my suitcase and I almost was ready to bust out a very large "manly knife" to rip it open so I could get to my booty. Fortunately a little TLC prevailed and I got my suitcase open without resorting to violence and destruction. The the suitcase wasn't mine, it was Brandon and Debbie's, which is another good reason I didn't tear it open.

This year I won't be flying. Marc Dickinson and I are taking a road trip to Chicago. I hope the weather cooperates. The three things I'm looking forward to the most: drinking with my friends, the AWP book fair, and the off-site readings on Friday night.

Of course, I've highlighted a few panels. I'd like to take advantage of the conference a little more this year. Last year Luke, BJ, and I stayed up later and later each night, and got up later and later each morning. It was awesome!

But this year I'm looking forward to arriving fully stocked: a cooler with beer, a trunk with spare beers to be added to the cooler when said cooler is empty, and a few bottles of single malt Scotch whisky (probably 12 Year MaCallan's). It truly will be Cartons and Kegs. Luke, BJ, Marc, myself, perhaps even Ron Sandvik, and anyone else who wants to join the party(s).

Stuff

2009-01-27T19:02:00.000-08:00

I was going to blog about "Typography in Poetry" (my first post about my "poetry book score card") but I have a cold that's kicking my ass. So my brain isn't up for anything overtly demanding. So, instead I'm going to say that I love Cate Marvin's Fragment of the Head of Queen. Cate Marvin kicks ass. I just said "kicks ass" or a similar variation twice in one paragraph. Fuck!

I'm currently reading:

Matthew Harvey, Pity the Bathtub Its Forced Embrace of the Human Form
Arts & Letters (Issue 18)
Indiana Review (30.2)

There's an incredible shorty story by Anthony Farrington in this issue

Shih-Shah Henry Tsai, Perpetual Happiness: The Ming Emperor Yongle
Saul Bellow, Henderson the Rain King

I'm hoping to post a semi-review of Cate Marvin's in the next week.

*
Check this out:

A 93-year-old man froze to death inside his home just days after the municipal power company restricted his use of electricity because of unpaid bills, officials said.

This is the kind of indifference that just baffles me. Doesn't the municipal power company have any culpability in this tragedy given the age of the customer?

Farkle

2009-01-26T19:18:00.000-08:00

I love Farkle. I've blogged about it before but I have to admit that it's my favorite game and I love playing it with Megan and the boys. As I have done before our Farkle standings to date are:

Gavin - 18
Jon - 17
Elijah - 16
Megan - 12

The numbers above represent the number of games each person has won. Gavin has been the "King of Farkle" since September and hasn't relinquished his top spot in almost 6 months. He rubs his "blanky" for good luck with his right hand fingers while rolling with his left hand.

Speaking of Gavin, the other night he said something hilarious and disturbing for a parent during a Farkle game. The objective in Farkle is to be the first to reach 10,000+ points. Once a player reaches 10,000+ points, the other players have one turn to beat the top score.

Gavin reached 11,050 and the nearest score was 9,050 which typically is a pretty safe cushion. But not on Sunday night. Megan rolled doubles and then 1,200. When I announced the mom had just passed him he screamed "dammit."

We all froze. His jaw dropped and eyes bulged. We stared at him in opulent silence. Then Megan started chuckling. I couldn't contain myself so I started laughing. Of course, Elijah laughed. And finally Gavin cracked a smile and stated rather profusely and repeatedly "I meant to say darn it! I meant to say darn it!" Through our snickering and lack of composure both Megan and I stated "that's not an appropriate word...we don't use that word."

Of course we probably lost all credibility by laughing. I think we were both so utterly shocked and we were both feeling like "dammit" because it seemed impossible that Megan was going to beat his score. And by the way, Elijah topped by Megan and Gavin with a final score of 11,550.

Perhaps, I'll bring my travel Farkle to AWP and coax BJ, Luke, and Marc into a drunken game of Farkle. We'll see...

I'm so one of those guys...blogging about Farkle?

Scorecard

2009-01-25T18:23:00.000-08:00

The other day (Jan 12th and 13th to be exact) I referred to a rating scale I've developed for poetry books. I've identified different poetic components that I often reflect upon (some more so and some less so) while I read a book of poems. I rate each component on a scale from 1-5, add up the score, and then rate the book based on the total score. Here are the scales:

1 = I hated it 1 = Not at all

2 = I didn’t like it 2 = Not really

3 = I liked it 3 = Sort of does

4 = I really liked it 4 = Yes it does

5 = I loved it 5 = Absolutely does

The reason I have two different scales is because, for example, a poet's book might employ a lot of alliteration, assonance, consonance, slant rhyme, internal rhyme, etc. but I don't particularly like their use of the sonic level. So, for the Sonic Level I rate a book of poetry on two levels:

One, is it present = objective
Two, do I like it = subjective

Of course not every category is like this and I know this sounds very nerdy and almost too scientific for what is often viewed as an intuitive art but several years ago I felt compelled to analyze and critique the books I was reading rather then just reduce my responses to simple "knee-jerk reactions" (i.e., "I don't like it" or "I liked it"). Perhaps I just want to be more interesting in my conversations about poetry but I've always been intrigued by exploring the questions: "What is Poetry" and "What constitutes good poetry." I think my desire to explore these questions has lot to do with my desire to explore and understand a philosophy of what is beautiful (of course this exploration is going to be very subjective and preferential at times).

But my score card breaks down into the following components and their corresponding sub-categories:

Typographical
The Sonic Level
The Sensory Level
Diction
Craft
Formal Range
Meaning
Originality
Structure
Vision
Emotive
Likability
Credibility

Now, I realize not many people read my blog but I'm open to suggestions about my score card if missing something. Beyond being nerdy though, the scorecard has helped me become more objective and fair in some readings. For example, I may think a particular poet lacks originality but a few poems illicit emotive responses, they attempt to conjure meaning in their poetry, and their sonic level is pretty good. So, I'm going to at least find some redeeming qualities in their poetry instead of simply saying: "this poetry sucks ass!" and then proceed to chuck the book against the wall.

That's it...My twenty minutes are up.

Today's Bullet Points

2009-01-24T14:02:00.000-08:00

Here's what I did today (in bullet points):

Revised two poems
Watched Cars twice with Brayden and he tried to con me into letting him watch it a third time
Read National Geographic (July 2008)
Finished reading chapter 5 and parts of chapter 6 in Perpetual Happiness: The Ming Emperor Yongle
Finished reading Craig Cotter's Chopstix Numbers
Prepared lunch for Brayden: fish sticks, tater tots, and applesauce
Read I Spy with Brayden
Folded 3 baskets of laundry
Sorted laundry and did 4 loads of laundry
Cleaned kitchen and did dishes
Blogged
Chatted with Travis Mullen and Dan Nichols via Facebook
Found out Adam Muller moved to Nashville
Gave Brayden a bath - he peed on the potty tonight (we're trying to potty train him)
Watched Lord of the Rings: the Fellowship of the Ring with Elijah and Gavin
Watched Battlestar Galactica Season 4 episode 1 - it was amazing
Watched Max Payne when Megan went to bed
Drank 2 Guinness's and a Samuel Smith Taddy Porter

Exciting times...exciting times.

Another Emperor Poem

2009-01-23T17:44:00.000-08:00

I finished a rough draft for another "emperor poem". So far I've finished 5 but it hasn't been until more recently that I've focused all my attention on completing a series of "emperor poems." So far the titles are:

"The Burial of an Emperor" - which appeared in Notre Dame Review (Issue #25)
"The Emperor's Eunuch"
"The Emperor Orders Death By One Thousand Cuts"
"The Emperor Plays A Divination Game"
"The Emperor Has His Ex-Adviser Buried In the Snow"

I've got a few ideas for future "emperor poems" but I need to continue my research. This has become my new project. I think poets (or in my case aspiring poets) need projects whether they be a chapbook, a book, a series of poems, etc. Or at least I need projects.

But the one thing I hate is the great "sigh" after completing a poem: it is both gratifying and frustrating. On one hand its gratifying because I've finished something with language and yet on the other hand I always have this feeling of "where do I go from here" which is the exact feeling I have right now: what do I work on next? When I experience this I usually will revise an old poem until a new idea surfaces or try a writing prompt if I want to continue composing.

In Review

2009-01-22T19:53:00.001-08:00

This is a completely worthless post but I've been utilizing Netflix profusely since canceling cable. I've watch the following movies this month thus far (including ratings):

Charlie Bartlett, 5 out of 5
The Darjeeling Limited, 3 out of 5
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, 2 out of 5
The Other Boleyn Girl, 2 out of 5
Burn After Reading, 2 out of 5
Hancock, 3.5 out of 5
Signs, 4 out of 5

These ratings are based on the Netflix rating scale:

1 = I hated it
2 = I didn't like it
3 = I liked it
4 = I really liked it
5 = I loved it

I don't love a lot of movies. A movie has to really impress me and Charlie Bartlett really impressed me. Anton Viktorovich Yelchin was pretty amazing not to mention the fact that Robert Downey Jr. is pretty cool.

Of course I've seen Signs oodles of times before but I was a bad Dad and let my kids (Elijah and Gavin...not the youngest) watch it. They've seen it before at my in-laws so I didn't figure it would be a big deal. But of course, it freaked them out. Quite frankly it freaked me out when I first saw it in the theatre. After the movie I was standing outside our apartment drinking a beer. The screen was open and my wife started making the alien-clicking noise which startled me. Megan speaks alien-click fluently.

I loved the cast in The Darjeeling Limited but wasn't overly impressed by the movie. I usually enjoy John C. Reilly (he was great in Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby and not so great in Stepbrothers), but I didn't enjoy Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story.

Like I said...pointless post.

Bank Bits

2009-01-21T20:25:00.000-08:00

I work in the internet residential lending division for a small bank based out of Kansas City, MO. I went to the restroom yesterday and while I was walking down the hall I heard the sounds of the ocean along with other inspirational instruments: wind chimes, light flutes, etc. I looked down the hall to see where the music was coming from and saw two massage chairs with some of the women from our operational staff (i.e., processors, underwriters, closers, etc.) getting massages. The music, of course, was to soothe their souls. It was the oddest thing I've ever witnessed at the bank. I guess these are stressful times and the VP of Residential Lending felt it was worthwhile to provide some relief for our overworked operational staff.

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While on the subject of work, yesterday I was sharing with one my co-workers that the thing I love about Obama is that he highlights that the government can't fix everything and he extols Americans to get involved, serve, sacrifice, etc. to provide opportunities for everybody to achieve the American Dream. He's even alluded to the fact that "we're all on this together," which is a sentiment that was expressed by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.

My co-worker, who's also a staunch Republican, said (and I'm paraphrasing a little bit), "I'm sacrificing by putting food on the table and taking care of my four kids." I hang out with this particular co-worker occasionally and even have sushi with him from time to time. But he's also the top producer in the internet lending division and makes a lot of money. This mentality, which is fairly common in the industry I work in, is going to be an impediment to real long-lasting change and is another reason why, while I enjoy my job and am fortunate to work for the bank, I struggle working in an industry predicated on production: ultimately any industry predicated on production cares about one thing...the bottom line, which is making more money and protecting its own self-interests.

I'll stop...that's the only rant I have. I really don't want to appear as if I'm complaining though because I truly feel blessed by the opportunity I've had to work for the bank...The End.

Spongia Solis

2009-01-20T19:07:00.000-08:00

Spongia Solis is the title of the manuscript I finally put to rest. Essentially I arrived at a place a few months ago in which I didn't care about the manuscript any more. I'd been working on it for approximately 6 years so I quickly put in one final push of organizing the content and then grew indifferent towards it. I believe the indifference is what I need to start submitting it out.

So, starting this month I'm going to submit it to at least 2 publishers and/or contests per month for 2009 and beyond. Those who are familiar with me know that I am tenacious about familiarizing myself with journals and submitting to literary journals. I've applied that same tenacity to familiarize myself with small presses over the past 2 years (since "The Great Purge of 2006" I blogged about yesterday). As a result, I'm ready to apply the same tenacity to submitting out Spongia Solis.

Here's to the adventure (me lifting an imaginary or not-so-imaginary glass of MaCallan's single malt Scotch whisky...12 year...very good and recently on sale).

On a side note, I've indefinitely stopped submitting poems to journals. I decided back in September that I wanted to take a break for a year and focus on writing new material and submitting Spongia Solis. I'll probably get back to submitting to literary journals next fall but I think I'm going to do it on a much more limited scale (more on this later).

Not-So Day Off

2009-01-19T08:47:00.000-08:00

I had today off due to the fact that I work for a bank that observes Martin Luther King Jr. Day. But of course, since I work in the residential lending division, if I voluntarily choose to work...I can. So, its not a forced day off. So, I worked from 12:30-5 pm. I've been very busy recently and needed to catch up on some unfinished work.

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Megan and I did not watch The Namesake last night. I talked to Luke Pingel on the phone. Megan was tired and didn't want to stay up late. So, she watched 30 Rock and ate cheese and crackers while I talked to Luke about football, AWP, poetry, and other stuff. I love talking to Luke. He sent me his thesis/manuscript in process. I'm reading it and enjoying it; its the first new work of Luke's I've read (new stuff meaning stuff that's been written in the last 12-18 months).

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On another note, I've mentioned "The Great Purge of 2006" the other day. This over dramatic title refers to the winter of 2006 when I purged my entire library with the exception of approximately 20 poetry books. At the time I internally justified the purge with the following reasons: (1) I was buying too many books indiscriminately (i.e., lots of impulse purchases at Half Price Books or Barnes and Nobles) which was a waste of money, (2) I wasn't reading any of the books I purchased, (3) I was moving around a lot at the time and hated moving all of the books, and (4) the books weren't aesthetically appealing on my bookshelves (this last one is a little superficial and teeters on obsessive-compulsive). I probably rid myself of 750-1000 books (which may be a very conservative estimate).

From that time on I purchased books based on a couple of factors:

To gain greater familiarity with contemporary poets and small presses

I do this by buying 5-7 books at a time from a specific press. I choose the books based on referrals from poet's blogs, choosing poets from the presses catalog that I'm familiar with, and referrals from friends. For example, I recently purchased a bunch of books from Ahsata's catalog and will probably purchase another slew of them because there are quite a few books that are on my "hit list."
If I find a poet I'm particularly fond of I'll purchase their other books even if they're not with the same press. For example, I really enjoyed Dan Beachy-Quick's True North, South Bright, which led me to purchase his Mulberry which led me to purchase 3-5 Tupelo Press books, which then led me to buy Spell and the aforementioned slew of books from Ahsatha Press.

To non poetry and poetry books from publishers I admire

For example I love Library of America's hardbacks. There a little expensive but they'll last a long time and the publish beautiful books
New Directions for their affordable publications of marginalized poets, etc. both past and present
Routledge Classics for their gorgeous philosophy and religious texts. They're mostly British and European philosophers and religious thinkers but I think some of the best 20th Century philosophers and religious thinkers were from Europe: e.g., Simone Weil.
Penguins Classics for their affordable translations of European novelists...of course the more mainstream novelists but I don't give a fuck.

Well, this is a rather geeky method of collecting books but I'm kind of nerdy about books. The great thing has been that I read all the books I purchase before I purchase more (most the time). Of course I do regret some of the books I got rid of: I wish that still had Theodore Adorno's Aesthetic Theory and Walter Benjamin's The Arcades Project plus a few other poetry books but oh well.

Errands, etc.

2009-01-18T15:43:00.000-08:00

I ran a variety of errands today: I made 4 copies of Spongia Solis (more on this later) at Staples, got lunch supplies at Hy-Vee for work which also included Breton crackers and boursin garlic and fine herbs gourmet cheese for tonight when Megan and I watch The Namesake, and I got laundry detergent (I've been the laundry drill Sargent for the past two weeks) and lithium batteries for our digital camera so that I can show you this:

Elijah and Gavin finished their dinner. Megan and I cleared the table. Brayden stuck around and made an unprompted NASCAR collage around his dinner plate earlier this week. Starting with Juan Pablo Montoya and ending with Jimmie Johnson, he surrounded his breakfast casserole and croissant with 1/64 scale die cast NASCAR cars. And yes, its sad, but I know the names of the drivers of every single car he lined up around his plate.

Tonight is movie night with the boys since they don't have school tomorrow and I don't work. Sometimes its cool to work for a bank. We're going to watch the first 1/3 of Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. The little one (Brayden) will not be watching; he'll be in bed.

Math Conference

2009-01-17T07:19:00.000-08:00

I finished a rough draft earlier this week. Although I've been writing on a regular basis and finally finalized my manuscript (Spongia Solis, which means "sun spots" I think) I haven't finished a lot of new drafts over the past 8 months: four to be exact. It hasn't been due to a lack of effort. I have been writing consistently but have been composing new poems very, very slowly.

The poem I finished was another "emperor" poem. I've been writing an "emperor" poem here and there since July 2006. I've been focusing more intensely on them recently since finishing the nearly 6 year grueling process of organizing and revising Spongia Solis. Essentially their based on the life of the Chinese Yongle Emperor (i.e., Zhu Di) during the Ming Dynasty. I've been using several non-fiction books as well as translated Ming poetry as helpful source texts.

The poems aren't necessarily historically accurate (so you couldn't really call them 100% historical poems). Their fun poems to write. I've been trying to focus primarily on the "emperor" poems because I'd like to write 9-12 good ones for my next manuscript (Lonely sits the city), which is an entirely separate topic altogether.

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Megan spent most of the morning and early afternoon at a math conference at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. She can count up to three hours towards her 90 hours of practicum this semester if she attends. She's got two semesters left and one semester of student teaching (she's an elementary education major).

After the math conference we went out to eat for our monthly family dinner out. We went to McCoy's Public House, which is both an awesome restaurant and an outstanding brewery. I did not have a beer because it was 2 pm and I don't typically drink in the afternoon and I don't usually drink beer during our family dinner out. But McCoy's has the best IPA and you can get beer to go via 30 oz flip-top bottles which I didn't take advantage of today but will soon. Perhaps I'll lug some along to AWP.

Bathroom Soap Dispensers

2009-01-16T21:46:00.001-08:00

Megan saw a woman at Target wearing a Marshalltown Bobcats (the mascot for Marshalltown Senior High) sweatshirt. We don't see many folks in Kansas City from Marshalltown so Megan asked her if she was from Marshalltown. The woman responded by saying something like "no, I'm not from Marshalltown." Megan, somewhat taken back, said that she only asked because of the sweatshirt. The woman then said in an exclamatory tone (in a slightly southern Missouri drawl) "I'm not from Marshalltown!" and walked off; although I envision her storming or stomping off.

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I love Farkle so here's a Farkle standings update:

Gavin - 18
Jon - 16
Elijah - 15
Meg - 12

I've climbed out of the gutter. But Gavin is still the "King of Farkle." The other night Gavin said "when I roll good I think of bathroom soap dispensers." I have no idea what he meant. Both Megan and I asked but his explanation didn't make sense. Sense doesn't matter I suppose though: what he said was creative and funny.

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I've finished the following books so far this month:

Bill Rasmovicz, The World In Place of Itself

One foot in the ethereal, one foot on the street corner. I liked it.

Peggy Hamilton, forbidden city

I'm not sure what to think about PH's forbidden city. All I can think about is a scene from episode one of the first season of Its Always Sunny In Philadelphia. If you know the show...I'll let you guess what scene I'm referring to...if you know PH's forbidden city.

Much more reading to go. But of course, I'm sure I'll purchase a bunch more books at AWP.

Pay Day

2009-01-15T19:29:00.000-08:00

Tonight I've got nothing but bullet points:

Today was pay day which meant Pay Day Sushi. A few of my colleagues and I celebrate pay day by going out for sushi.
Megan forgot to pick me up from work. My call at 7:07 pm and went like this: "Hey Megan where are you?" I was expecting her to say "I'm on I-435" or "I'm a few minutes away...be looking for me." Nope. She said something like "Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry...its past 7 isn't it." I didn't get home until after 8 pm because we stopped at Target for toilet paper and for a 6 pack of Guinness.
I'm so one of those people.
I ate two bowls of frosted mini-wheats for dinner.
I drank a glass of Glinlivet and had a pint of Guinness for desert.
I watched an episode of The Tudors.
I'm definitely one those people: a mere food eater. I'm not complaining though...so is life: a few splashes here and there (or death defying dives) but mostly treading water. I just want to enjoy the scenery while I tread water.

I was checking out a few off-site events at AWP and there's a couple cool ones on Friday night definitely worth checking out:

6:00PM NO THOUSANDS: A Small Press Reading
Location: The Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western Ave.
Cost: Free
Black Ocean; Cannibal Books; Forklift, Ohio; Octopus Books; and Rope-A-Dope Press Present: Dean Young, Johannes Gransson, Joshua Harmon, Claire Donato, Kevin Holden, Russell Dillon, Alexis Orgera, Eric Baus, Shane McCrae, Sampson Starkweather, and Chris Tonelli.

8:00PM Rabbit Light Live
Location: New Wave Coffee, 2557 N. Milwaukee Ave, Chicago
Cost: Free
Website: http://www.rabbitlightmovies.com
Readings by poets Srikanth Reddy, Lisa Fishman, Lily Brown, Noah Eli Gordon, Arda Collins, Richard Meier, Sarah Gridley, Suzanne Buffam, Abraham Smith, Sara Veglahn, Jaswinder Bolina, and Christopher Stackhouse.

Black Ocean and Octopus Books are awesome. I don't know much about the other presses but if this event is any thing like last years event in Brooklyn it will be fucking cool.

Bills

2009-01-14T17:00:00.000-08:00

Today I was thrown out of my routine. The day started well: after getting up at 6:15, drinking some coffee and what not, I read a little of Cate Marvin's Fragment of the Head of a Queen and wrote for an hour or so.

But then I got to work and had 3 hours of training which threw me all out of whack. I work for a bank, and as a result, I have a bevy of compliance related annual training classes I have to attend. Today it was Fair Lending which covered HMDA, the Fair Housing Act, Equal Credit Opportunity Act, and the Community Recover Act. These are all very important anti-discriminatory acts in the real estate and financing realms but the training still disrupted my routine and put me 3 hours behind in what was an already busy day. But I'm not complaining...I like busy!!! I really do!!!

Tonight I have nothing interesting...I'm paying a months worth of bills because tomorrow's payday. I only get paid once per month so that means a lot of budgeting as well. But if I get done early there will be Glenlivet and beer to celebrate the completion of "bill day" and "pay day."

I wish I could blog about something more interesting but alas...it's not going to happen so I'll end things with one word: phenomenology. There, that's interesting.

Going to Bed Early

2009-01-13T19:38:00.001-08:00

Why don't we rate poetry books the same way we rate movies: honestly. I know there's a fine line between dissing a book and dissing a poet but typically the only feedback in the e-ether or elsewhere on a book of poetry is either positive reviews in literary journals (or e-journals), glowing blog gush, etc. Occasionally there's an insightful blog though about a book of poetry with a positive slant.

So, unless I'm missing something, why don't poets, bloggers, reviewers, etc. say "I didn't like this book and this is the reason why" or "I give this a 1 star out of 5." We all know books exist that just fall on their fucking faces but no body wants to be honest. To be fair, I don't think it would be prudent to be insulting just to be insulting. That's not what I'm talking about. But are reviewers, bloggers, poets being dishonest by not talking about what doesn't work?

Of course, there are some lively conversations about post-avant poets, SoQ poets, flarfists, etc., etc. which teeter on the edge of being exclusionary, overly academic, and careerist. But is the only reason for a lack of honest criticism about the good, the bad, and the ugly in poetry because of fear regarding retribution, career roadblocks, etc., etc. Or is my comparison bad since movies are, primarily, entertainment and not art, and of course poetry is art so it can't be judged in the same way. Or perhaps film is art and poets should judge poetry by similarly honest and constructive (of course) means.

I rated The Other Boleyn Girl as a 2 star out of 5 stars on Netflix because I didn't like the move. What does this say about poetry?

I've ran out of thoughts and I'm bored. Megan is going to bed early tonight which means I'm going to watch an episode of The Tudors by myself.

Belated Christmas Book List

2009-01-12T17:41:00.001-08:00

This is a little late but besides some new Fiestaware and cologne I received the following books for Christmas (most of which were purchased with several Barnes and Nobles gift cards):

Saul Bellow, Novels 1956-1964
Michelle de Montaigne, An Apology for Raymond Sebond
Craig Cotter, Chopstix Numbers
Linda Dyer, Fictional Teeth
Peggy Hamilton, forbidden city
David Mutschelcner, Esse
Ethan Paquin, The Violence
Lance Phillips, Cur aliquid vidi
Lance Phillips, Corpus socius
Carolyn Wright, Stealing the Children
Leslie Adrienne Miller, Yesterday Had A Man In It
Tina Brown Celona, Snip Snip!
Tina Brown Celona, The Real Moon of Poetry and Other Poems
Anthony McCann, Father Noise
Joyelle McSweeney, The Commandrine and Other Poems
Joyelle McSweeney, The Red Bird
Robert Creeley, Life & Death
Robert Creeley, Just In Time: Poems 1984-1994
Jerome Rothenberg, Vienna Blood & other poems

I guess you could say I've got a lot of reading to do. In addition to these books I found a bunch of books I thought I got rid of during "The Great Purge of 2006" (which I don't have time to get into right now). I found, among others, my The Collected Poems of Frank O'Hara and Selected Poems of Robert Creeley which are both lovely editions from the University of California Press. I was elated and had to re-arrange my bookshelves as a result.

I want to rate each book after I read it. I love rating movies through Netflix. They have a very simplistic rating scale:

1 = I hated it
2 = I didn't like it
3 = I liked it
4 = I really liked it
5 = I loved it

I've developed a similar rate system but use a convoluted and nerdy scorecard to arrive at my rating. But I don't know if I'm going to post the ratings. It's more difficult to publicly rate a book of poetry than it is a movie. I'll probably go into more detail tomorrow.

Why I Do It

2009-01-11T10:48:00.000-08:00

I'm a horrible blogger. I often feel too busy to post regularly: kids, job, kids, wife, kids, more kids, I wish more wife (I love you Meg), more job, and somewhere in there I try to fit in some writing. But ultimately I think there may be another reason why I don't blog more regularly. The reason is an unanswered question: why do I blog or what's the point of blogging?

By reading numerous "poet blogs" I could probably reduce the purpose of blogging into 5 categories: gratuitous self-promotion, less gratuitous self-marketing, promoting poetry (with a subtle hint of wanting to gain notoriety or attention from said promotion), social networking, and poetic/aesthetic conversation (either civil or uncivil conversations about contemporary poetics or aesthetics; although I would lean more towards poetic conversations because most of the individuals referencing aesthetics are often describing personal preference and not a philosophy of art). So, lets re-cap the categories with bullets:

Gratuitous self-promotion
Less gratuitous self-marketing
Promoting poetry
Social networking
Poetic/Aesthetic conversation

I have no idea where I fall within these 5 categories. I suspect I have a little of each. But ultimately I hate self-marketing (it always feels gratuitous to me). I enjoy promoting poetry, I would like to network but dislike most people I meet, and I enjoy poetic/aesthetic conversations but find most of them long-winded, academic, and often misguided.

For example, I hate how poets refer to Ludwig Wittgenstein. I feel that, by and large, poets misinterpret Wittgenstein and use his work to support their own agendas, ideologies, aesthetics, etc. Also, most the time I don't give a fuck about the newest school of poetry that's developing or the newest literary theory or what so-and-so thinks about contemporary poetry because I would rather be reading and writing poetry than talking about poetry in such driveling, irrelevant ways.

Although I will say that Johannes Goransson's discussions and responses are very inclusive and non-dismissive. And Seth Abramson's discussions are lively and inclusive as well; although they are a little long-winded at times. Both of their blogs are refreshing and I'm not including either of them with my aforementioned comments.

So, why do I blog? I don't know why I blog which is why I'm having a difficult time finding a reason to continue blogging. Perhaps I need to follow BJ's lead and get more interesting. Perhaps I need to blog about more interesting topics which may provide more motivation and satisfaction from blogging. But alas, I have so little time and getting more interesting takes too much time.

I guess I'm just one of those guys. Tonight I'll be watching Arrested Development Season 3-the episode that exposes Mr. F. Of course, I already know who Mr. F is because tonight will be the third time I've watched Arrested Development Season 3.

Thanksgiving Highlights

2008-12-01T05:49:00.001-08:00

I went to Marshalltown this weekend for Thanksgiving. The highlights were:

103.3 was playing the same bands they were playing 10-15 years ago: Stone Temple Pilots, Live, Quiet Riot, etc., etc. It's odd how in Iowa things stay the same. They don't of course...things in Iowa change...just much slower...it's as close to static as you're going to get.
My in-law's new coffee maker...awesome!
The wood burning stove in my parents' basement: very cozy.
Younkers and the great new Fiestaware set Megan and I bought on sale: off-white.
Zeno's pizza.
Snow.

Not a very interesting post but a post nonetheless. Until next time...

For You Tonight

2008-11-01T19:27:00.000-07:00

Tonight all I have are bits:

Megan, the kids, and I watched Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds. My son Gavin kept asking when somebody was going to get their eyes torn out by a bird. The Birds is pretty cool.

My Christmas wish: starting the day after Thanksgiving I want to watch a Christmas-themed movie every night leading up to Christmas. That ought to be fun!!! Home for the Holidays, Elf, Its a Wonderful Life, etc., etc. Any suggestions on Christmas movies? I need to fill up my Netflix que now so that I'm prepared.

"Your hair was long when we first met..." My sons both got their hair cuts this weekend. They both have fairly long hair. Elijah's hair is below his shoulders. Gavin's is shoulder length. Megan brought it up above their shoulders. Our kids are totally going to be skater punks. A few years ago we were at Loose Park in Kansas City. Elijah was 5. He was playing in a huge sand box with other kids. Some kid told him his favorite music was The Wiggles and asked Elijah "What's your favorite music." He nonchalantly says Bad Religion and keeps digging in the sand.

I like Beirut.

That's it...that's all I got.

But I've been using partial song lyrics for my blog post titles. So, here's some breadcrumbs that will help you name the artist for my Song-Lyric Title: this band's singer is, besides being super famous, also featured in The Pixies documentary Pixies. This one's pretty easy.

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On Deck: Aesthetics #2...Oh yeah, I'm not finished yet and this time we're going to talk about Ted Kooser.

Aesthetics

2008-10-29T19:53:00.000-07:00

I’ve been reading Bernard Bosanquet’s translation of Hegel’s Introductory Lectures on Aesthetics recently. I read it back in 2002 but decided to revisit it and a few things have struck me so far. Hegel asserts that there are “two opposite ways of treating” the subject of aesthetics. I may be misreading Hegel but aesthetics appears to refer to “a knowledge of the essence of fine art” (17) or a philosophy of art or the science of what is beautiful (which does not include nature). Art includes painting, sculpting, music, poetry, etc. So I’m going to discuss Hegel’s Introductory Lectures on Aesthetics from a poetic perspective.

First, there is the development of theories that “govern both criticism and artistic production” (18, italics mine). These theories rely upon an extensive familiarity with classic and contemporary poetry, a vast knowledge of history, a vivid imagination to recall the varied forms, movements, etc. within classic and contemporary poetry. These theories lead to judgments which form tastes or personal preference. Hegel states that “it remains invariably the case that every man judges works of art…according to the measure of his insight and his feelings” (19). To put it another way, we develop theories based on our knowledge and our tastes, which informs our criticism of poetry and poetic production or what elements we believe should be part of the production of beautiful poetry. Perhaps it’s kind of like having a wealth of knowledge about Chili and arriving at what one believes to be the perfect recipe for Chili.

The second way of treating the subject of aesthetics is a general treatment of poetry that doesn’t touch on the particulars of poetry (language, craft, form, etc.) but is a more of an abstract philosophy of what is beautiful. This second means of treating aesthetics should transcend personal preference, taste, etc.

This leads me to something, or actually two specific things, that have pissed me off in the past few years. First, there was Billy Collins’ introduction to Best American Poetry 2006 as well as his comments at the Best American Poetry event at the New School in September 2006 which included comments that pitted his so-called “school of clarity” against the “school of difficulty” or “water” against “mud.”

Secondly, there was Charles Wright’s introduction to the Best American Poetry 2008 in which Wright states: “I like things to make sense nowadays. Putting aside the nagging possibility that one man’s sense is another man’s sensibility, as the years wind down, I like a definitiveness in things, I want to understand them, even though I know there is precious little sense in earthly affairs (or unearthly ones, for that matter), and God knows not an unlit wick of understanding. Art is supposed, they say, to make sense out of the senseless, coherence out of the incoherent, and connections out of the unconnectible.” He goes onto to comment on the health of contemporary poetry: not a lot of bad poems, but not a lot of good ones (you can see more about this conversation on John Gallaher’s blog).

I was incensed at Billy Collins’ remarks. I was disappointed with Charles Wright’s comments. But after re-reading Hegel I started thinking that their comments are indicative of the theories they’ve developed regarding criticism and artistic production which have led to judgments about what should be in a poem or to use my chili metaphor what ingredients make the best possible chili. Their comments are not reflective of an abstract philosophy of what is beautiful. Their comments are reflective of personal taste…not truth.

Of course there’s going to be conflict between differing theories and Hegel admits as much by suggesting disputes will arise as to which theory is the essential theory. The error occurs when one confuses a practical theory of criticism and artistic production for an abstract philosophy of what is beautiful or vice versa which I think Wright does by articulating that "art is supposed, they say, to make sense out of the senseless..." which seems more like a function of art but the definitiveness of his comment seems to imply something much larger the function or a theory of criticism or artistic production. In addition, I think it’s egregious to believe there is one essential theory…after all haven’t Collins or Wright been to a chili cook off. I don’t like spicy chili but that doesn’t make spicy chili bad chili. Hell, I know people that like Hormel chili just fine. So, I don't know what I'm concluding other then the fact that perhaps anthologies suck unless they're truly like a good old fashioned chili cook off.

Weekend Update

2008-10-29T19:47:00.000-07:00

Megan and I went to Metallica at the Spring Center. It was awesome. I'm not a big Metallica fan but it was one of my favorite concerts. They played a lot of older stuff. They made an effort to appeal to both the black album and post black album fans as well as appealing to their hard core fan base: those like my wife who has Kill 'Em All, Ride the Lightning, Master of Puppets, and ...And Justice for All but not Metallica or anything thereafter.

This is The End of Everything

2008-10-23T20:43:00.000-07:00

Goodbye cable. Goodbye E-Music. Goodbye...

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Tonight I went to see Charles Simic read at the Midwest Poets Series at Rockhurst University. There was a guy next to me playing Who Wants To Be A Millionaire or something like it on his cell phone. There was a little round hairy fella behind me with a sack full of Charles Simic books who would read poems to himself and chuckle incessantly...not on cue I might add. And of course there was the individual who sat down behind me half way through the reading who smelled like sour milk and Mad Dog.

But besides the interesting people I felt like I should have been sitting on a big bear rug listening to Charles Simic tell stories: he sitting cross legged, sipping single malt, smoking a cigarette in front of a roaring fire; me sitting...listening, listening, listening. He had a very dry sense of humor. He was soft spoken. His poetry was dark and yet the imagery was often (not always) very original and disarming. But he was so soft spoken, or perhaps it was poor acoustics mixed with a small voice, made it difficult to focus and hear the poems. So, unfortunately I often found myself shifting in my seat in an attempt to retain some semblance of focus because when I did I was pleasantly surprised.

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A few days ago when Megan and the kids let the dog out they discovered that both the front and back gates were open. Neither Megan nor the kids nor I left the gate open. The only possible reason for the open gate is that someone cut through our backyard between 11:30 pm and 6:00 am. That's a little disconcerting because we have a wooded area beyond our fence. Elijah conjectured that Hawkeye (our Boston Terrier) was not smart enough to open the gates. Gavin added that a "bunny" is too small to open the gates. I told them the only animal capable of opening the gates would be a werewolf. My son Elijah refused to close the gates. I'm a cruel father. My wife played into it later by suggesting she saw a werewolf in the woods. But then we both defused a possibly disastrous onslaught of fear by telling the kids there are no werewolf's and that we were only kidding.

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Farkle scoreboard:

Gavin = 15
Elijah = 13
Me = 11
Megan = 10

Gavin is creating quite a lead. He's a dominating Farkle player.

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Bread crumbs for the song lyric title (or name that song or artist): he guest appeared as uncle Bob in the movie I watched tonight: That Thing You Do.

Last Night He Could Not Make It

2008-10-21T20:07:00.000-07:00

he tried hard but he could not make it...so tonight he will (this last part is mine).

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I finished David Kirby's The Temple Gate Called Beautiful last night. This was my first Kirby book. Kirby's poetry is "talky" and is similar to Albert Golbarth. I'm not really sure what to do with some "talky" poetry and in Kirby's case I enjoyed a few poems, including the title poem, but found myself getting completely lost in the 3-5, 5-7 page poems that were littered with one literary or artistic or historical reference after another. I often felt like I do when I watch Go Diego, Go with my son Brayden...1/3 paying attention, 1/3 amused, and 1/3 nodding off. Now, I know this isn't entirely fair to Mr. Kirby which is why I've ordered 3 more of his books to get a broader perspective because there were moments I laughed and had fun reading his poems so I'm trying to be pragmatic about it. Perhaps it's Kirby's barrage of artistic/literary references and a landscape that feels entirely irrelevant, and quite frankly, academic, that makes it more difficult to engage.

I have to add that I'm not adverse to "talky" poetry. I feel that Paul Guest, Bob Hicock, and Jason Bredle (these are just a few examples from what I've read in the past 12-18 months) work in "talky" modes but with very different typographies. And in the case of Jason Bredle, I often find myself euphoric, happy, etc. after I read one of his poems. I feel like I'm taking a cross country trip but taking state highways, especially the two lane highways in CO (a little treacherous but very scenic) instead of the interstates, and as a result, I witness a lot of the nuisances of the human experience that I would never noticed if I had just hoped on I-35 and headed north to Des Moines (you know, point to A to point B, point B to point C). BJ has a great description, which is probably more apt, of the often rewarding journey Bredle's poetry takes the reader on.

Thus, I would rate (on the Netflix rating scale of course) David Kirby's The Temple Gate Called Beautiful as a 2 1/2 stars out of 5, which is somewhere between "I don't like it" and "I like it." Ultimately, I may need to read the book again.

I always feel awkward and guilty being semi-critical of a poet. Should I???

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Farkle scoreboard:

Gavin = 14
Elijah = 13
Me = 11
Megan = 9

Yes, I have moved into 3rd place.

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Bread crumbs for the song lyric: the birth place of Demi Moore. Now you can try to guess the song lyric.

The Government Supplies Her Cocaine

2008-10-09T20:33:00.000-07:00

Bits:

I finished Matthea Harvey's Sad Little Breathing Machine this morning. If I was rating it on a Netflix scale I would say 3 out of 5 or "I liked it." But this is a very deceiving rating because when I finished I was left wanting more...more Matthea. Fortunately, I'm also finishing up Modern Life which, so far, is a 4 1/2 out of 5 which would be between "I really liked it" and "I loved it" on the Netflix rating system. I'll probably read both again soon because something about her poetry mystifies me.
I got rejected by The Journal today but it was a nice rejection with a little note from the editors, as opposed to a standard rejection slip. I only have a few outstanding submissions...and then I'm done for a while. BJ on the other hand just got a couple poems accepted. Congratulations BJ.
I'm forcing myself to read Ted Kooser: I've tried to read Delights and Shadows twice and failed both times. This time I will get through it. I want to be well read, even reading poets I don't necessarily like. I once read a poet's (RC) book and quite literally hated it to the extent that I threw it down on the ground. What did I do next? I bought 2 more of RC's books and read them just to give RC a fair shake. I hated the other 2 books even more than the first. But at least I read them.
I've started reading Paula Cisewski's Upon Arrival and Bill Rasmovicz's The World In Place of Itself.
I'm going to miss Hadara Bar-Nadav reading at the Writer's Place tomorrow night which makes me very sad.
My kids are going camping this weekend.
I won the "Family Farkle Game" tonight. I had a streak of winning 0 of the first 24 games we played over the past 2 months. I've caught up though:

Gavin = 14
Elijah = 12
Megan = 9
Me = 9

There's No Guaranties

2008-10-09T20:13:00.000-07:00

I can't figure out what to do with my manuscript. I've decided to stop submitting to journals until next fall. In the meanwhile I'm going to compose new poems, revise older poems, build up a stock pile of new material, and read. But I can't mitigate the bane of my creative existence: that first manuscript.

I suppose my struggle to complete, and maybe more importantly to feel comfortable, is normal but it begs an important question: why am I so hell bent on finishing my first manuscript? First, it seems like the next logical step in my poetic progression. I've had over a hundred accepted and/or published poems; although, I haven't had a ton published by "bigger" or "top tier" journals (although those monikers seem relative). Second, I want validation, which is probably, albeit honest, an inappropriate reason. I've always struggled immensely with the idea of referring to myself as a "poet" because--although I write a lot, read a lot, and have had a few poems published--I don't feel "legitimate" since I don't have a published collection of poetry. Although my reasons for wanting a published manuscript are not tenure, resume building, fame, fortune, etc., it is, quite possibly, driven by vanity.

It might be easy to conclude that perhaps the manuscript isn't ready yet. Of course my close friends BJ and Luke might say I'm being stupid. But I think one of my greatest fears associated with finishing my first manuscript is that I'll finish it, send it out, and then not like the final product: that it will be one of hundreds of mediocre poetry manuscripts. I've always wanted my poetry to matter and I'm afraid it won't matter. I'm not worried about rejection; after being rejected 768 times by literary journals, working in sales for a bank, and having my manuscript rejected 4 times thus far I'm used to rejection. It's part of the process.

One of my other fears is including poems in my first manuscript that really belong in another manuscript. I view my poetry thus far in different time periods:

2001-fall 2005
Summer 2004-present

The main difference between the two time periods are voice and form. My voice started shifting in late 2005 as I started experimenting with form but the shift initially started when I started writing a series of 12 Ghazals in the summer of 2004 in response to the arrest of a suspected (and now convicted) serial killer in Kansas City. I wrote one Ghazal for each victim. I just completed the twelfth in the series a few months ago. But the experimentation with the Ghazal as a form that usually expresses "both the pain and loss or separation and the beauty of love in spite of that pain" (according to Wikipedia) by using the Ghazal to express both loss and the affects of violence instead of love was the beginning of a shift in voice.

How does this relate to putting together my first manuscript? Well, the manuscript, until now, has included poems that were composed between 2001 and 2005 and are primarily free verse (polyphonic prose). I've been working on the manuscript since March 2003 and since there was an overlap between the two developmental periods quite a few poems from my more recent work were sneaking into the manuscript but they seemed to have a different voice. So, the question I've been asking myself is should I include poems that from both developmental periods since they seem to have different voices?

To be honest, I'd much rather be focusing most of my energy on writing then obsessing about finishing my first manuscript. I don't know...perhaps there's a few chapbooks in my earlier poems and not a manuscript.

But ultimately does it really matter? I started writing poetry because I love poetry and can't get it out of my mind...it's like a sickness. When did it become about publication? After all, I never went to a MFA program so the pressures to compete, produce, build a resume through publication and award winning, etc. has never been prescient. Oh well, love is hell!

Moth Balls

2008-10-04T19:06:00.000-07:00

A few bits:

Everything smelled like moth balls today. I drove north on 69 and it smelled like moth balls; it was either the river or the rail road yards. I got some coffee at Broadway and the Oriental Rug store smelled like moth balls. I stopped by work and the parking lot smelled like moth balls...perhaps it was the fallen crab apples.
Megan, Gavin, Brayden, and I went to The Corner Cafe in Riverside for lunch. I ate too much.
Elijah's in Omaha with his friends: they're going to the Omaha Zoo tomorrow.
Megan and I are going to watch Iron Man tonight.
I have a lot of thoughts stirring around but I haven't had the time yet to postulate a written version of my thoughts.
I started David Kirby's The Temple Gate Called Beautiful and I like it so far. I have a list of Alice and James Books I will be purchasing very, very soon...perhaps even tonight.
The thoughts will come out...perhaps tomorrow night and Monday night.

Nobody Said It Was Easy

2008-10-03T15:14:00.000-07:00

My 401k has lost 17.06% of its value. I hate looking at but have to check it occasionally. I refuse to look at my IRA as it might be worth next to nothing. Ahhh, fun times...fun times.

Victoria Chang

2008-10-02T20:38:00.000-07:00

I went to the Victoria Chang reading tonight but before I get to the details I have to mention that the Digital and Web Manager for the KC Public Library, Kate Barsotti, tracked me down to explain the RVP thing: how did she do that?

Back to the Victoria Chang reading: it was brilliant. She read from Circles, then read from her new collection, Salvinia Molesta, before returning to Circles. I love this approach to a reading; it's the way I envision a good concert. You want to hear some of the oldies (that is the songs you're familiar with) because you may not be familiar with the newer songs. I've been to a lot of readings where the poet just assumes you're familiar with their old work and doesn't even bother reading any older poems and just launches into newer poems that most of the audience is completely unfamiliar with; I like a little bit of both. In addition, she was very unpretentious, down to earth, and interacted with the audience quite a bit: superb etiquette (if that's the right word).

Victoria Chang's poetry is, in every sense of the word, beautiful. She is economical with language. She interacts with history with a fresh and unique voice. She engages universal issues with elegance and grace. Her poetry is truly lyrical. Please pick up her book.

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On a non poetry note:

We had pork roast last night and my youngest son, Brayden (2 1/2), thought the brown gravy was poop, which of course, my eldest son thought was hilarious. Megan later told Elijah that Brayden is developing a schema for understanding the world and now he knows that brown and runny isn't always poop. Now, he knows brown and runny might be gravy. Of course, Elijah questioned this reasoning by asking: "How does he know a brownie's not poop or meat loaf. They're brown and clumpy."
I was embarrassed during the debate tonight. Governor Palin was very embarrassing. At one point, I went into my office to pay bills and shut the door so I couldn't hear her.
I got registered in Jackson County (I was registered in Black Hawk County in IA) and I'm definitely voting Obama...just to clarify the previous bullet point.
Did you hear about the earmarks connected to the Senate Bail Out Bill? Rum producers, auto racing, film and television production, and producers of wooden arrows?
Damage from speeding ticket from about a month ago: $105.00
Next readings: Hadara Bar Nadav at the Writer's Place next Friday and Charles Simic on Thursday October 23rd.

Promises

2008-10-01T19:38:00.000-07:00

I promise I'll blog more. I promise. I didn't mention this earlier because I was too busy not blogging but Cave Wall picked up a couple of my poems a few weeks ago. Cave Wall is an awesome journal and Rhett Iseman Trull is probably the most professional editor I've encountered and is talented poet to boot. Check out Cave Wall when you get a chance...you won't regret it.

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Victoria Change is reading at the gorgeous central library in downtown KC tomorrow night. I loved Circles. The KC Library's website is strange though; their website makes it sound as if you have to RSVP to attend the reading. But I think it's information mining; they just want to snag an e-mail, an address, and phone numbers so they can send me more junk mail.

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By the way, I suck at promises. Now, I'm going to take the trash out; tomorrow is trash day in KC.

Consolation

2008-09-14T18:52:00.001-07:00

I got a speeding ticket yesterday on the way to 810Zone in the Plaza. I guess the only consolation is that I was going to meet my brother to watch the Hawkeyes-Cyclones football game, and the Hawkeyes won.

Today I went to Broadway Cafe and Roastery to work on my poetry manuscript. Yes, an aspiring poet in a coffee shop is a cliche, as is an aspiring poet-blogger talking about a "poetry manuscript." It was, per usual, confusing. I sent the manuscript, in its first official incarnation (although, it had probably lived through at least a dozen different incarnations and/or drafts), to four contests in March. They were all rejected, which is expected and I am oddly not at all disappointed because a few days after sending out the batch for Round 1 I hated the structure, organization, etc. of the manuscript. I was comfortable with the majority of the poems; just not the structure. I am now revising it to resend out: Round 2!!! I expect this to be a very long bout.

By the way, if you like coffee and are ever in KC definitely go to Broadway. Also, if you're ever in SF definitely check out the Bluebottle Coffee Company; they are both exquisite roasteries.

Jesus' Spicy Side

2008-09-12T18:27:00.001-07:00

I really pretty much suck at blogging but I'm going to keep trucking because it can be fun. That said, my son, Gavin, engaged Megan and I in a conversation about good and evil yesterday. He had questions and theories about the devil (i.e., Satan, the dark one, the fallen angel, etc., etc.). Then our oldest son, Elijah, chimed in and told us that the devil is Jesus' spicy side...of course jokingly. Whether his comment was theologically correct or not doesn't matter...it was brilliant and very creative. I'm sure there would be some fundamentalist evangelicals who would be aghast at his comment but Megan and I thought it was hilarious. Jesus' spicy side?!? Perhaps those of you who occasionally read this blog are thinking: spicy side??? Check Spicy Town out. Brilliant!!!

On other, semi-spicy news: I love Matthea Harvey's poetry. I'm finishing up both Sad Little Breathing Machine and Modern Life. Perhaps I'm jumping on the M. Harvey band wagon. I don't give a shit...it's fun and poetry needs to be fund and inventive and complicated and puzzling and simple and interesting and wild. I mean shit..."The Future of Terror" and "Terror of the Future" poems are brilliant. I'm also reading Leslie Adrienne Miller's The Resurrection Trade, which I like so far, and Tony Hoagland's What Narcissism Means to Me which, at least so far, is better than Donkey Gospel. Of course this is just my opinion and I'm neither admitting or denying that I'm a fan of Hoagland's work. I'm also reading We by Yevgeny Zamyatan. Quite a full plate...but to write well...one must read well. I think William Shatner once said that.

Tonight I'm watching WWE Smack Down with the boys. When they go to bed I'll be chilling and drinking some Breckenridge Brewery Autumn Ale: good stuff.

Mostly Downloads

2008-08-24T14:05:00.000-07:00

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Downloads today:

Charles Mingus, Charles Mingus
Charlie Rouse, Takin' Care of Business
Ornette Coleman, Tomorrow is the Question
Sonny Rollins, Tenor Madness (Remastered)
Sonny Rollins, Way Out West
Sonny Rollins, Saxophone Colossus (Remastered)
Thelonious Monk and Sonny Rollins, Thelonious Monk / Sonny Rollins (Remastered)
Thelonious Monk, 5 By Monk By 5

So far my favorite is by far Charlie Rouse but Charles Mingus is right there as well. He's a great tenor saxophonist. And yes, I was in a little bit of a jazz mood this afternoon after eating Pizza Hut with the family over at Brandon and Debbie's, and talking jazz with Brandon for a little bit.

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The week in review: I was a featured reader at the Main Street Rage Poetry Showcase last Sunday which is held here, the boys had their first full week of school this week, Megan had her first full week of school as well, I had 4 more poems picked up by Epicenter on Friday, we ate at Oklahoma Joe's on Saturday which is one of the best BBQ spots in KC, and my parents stayed with us this weekend because my sister Cindy and her new baby Gabe were in town showing off.

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What I've been reading this week:

Matthea Harvey, Sad Little Breathing Machine
Matthea Harvey, Modern Life
Leslie Adrienne Miller, The Resurrection Trade

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Not exciting, but there you have it. Hopefully, I'll blog a little more often next week.

3 Nerds and a Calculator

2008-08-17T12:58:00.001-07:00

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Megan was listening to Pearl Jam's "Love, Reign O'er Me" or "Last Kiss" on the radio. She told me kids Eddie Vedder sounded like a goat and changed the radio station. I love Pearl Jam so her comment was blasphemous but I wasn't in the car. She turned it to a station playing Billy Idol's "White Wedding." My oldest son, Elijah, asked "What is this?" My wife joyously responded: "This is Billy Idol...he's awesome." There was silence; then Elijah added sardonically (and I'm sure he didn't know he was being sardonic) that he would rather listen to 3 nerds sing about calculators then listen to Billy Idol. Wow!!! What an amazing sense of humor!!! My middle son, Gavin, chuckled to himself and repeated "nerds...calculators" and continued chuckling to himself.

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I'm reading at The Writer's Place tonight...hopefully all goes well. I'm reading some of my new poems, which are a little lighter, and of course some of my heavier "hyper realism" poems as BJ would put it. By the way BJ, if you read this post, I've thought about the question you asked me at AWP often and I believe the answer is absolutely...I would characterize some of my poetry as "hyper realism."

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Since I haven't posted this week I need to mention that Megan and I celebrated our 11th Anniversary on Friday. We've known each other for 15 years. We went to Genghis Khan for dinner; if you're ever in Kansas City definitely check it out, especially if you're a vegetarian. Afterwards we went to Tropic Thunder at the Cinemark in the Plaza. I thought it was hilarious but also wholeheartedly agree with Megan when she said: "it was so wrong." But nonetheless, we both thoroughly enjoyed the movie. Robert Downey Jr. is very, very funny. Ben Stiller is Ben Stiller.

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Now is the semi-narcissistic portion of this post. Toot, toot!!! That's me tooting my own horn. I had two poems accepted by Pennsylvania English on Thursday. This might be just what I needed to break out of my slump.

What a Weekend

2008-08-10T19:03:00.001-07:00

I went to Iowa this weekend to visit my parents. We went to Taco John's: it was wonderful. We had Zeno's pizza. We watched the Olympics. But none of these were the highlight of my weekend. The highlight of my weekend came on Friday in the form of what I thought was a rejection letter. But I discovered it was more than a mere rejection letter. Although I may name the offender in a future post, I won't name the journal tonight.

The letter stated: "We're sorry but we do not accept poems generated by writer's submission services. We encourage you to purchase a copy of Journals Name to get a sense of the kind of work that interests us." The aforementioned statement was on the journal letterhead. I'm not sure if it was a standard form letter. At first, I wasn't sure what they were talking about. My thoughts were something like this: What the hell. What's a writer's submission service? Then it dawned on me that they were referring to those lame services that play on the hopes of aspiring writers by charging recurring fees to manage their submissions for them and I'm assuming the majority of said submissions are sent out blindly. Or at least this is my perception of writer's submission services as predatory organizations which may be wrong since I don't know much about them. I did a Google search using the key words Poetry Submission Service and there are quite a few services out there.

First of all, I have never used a submission service in my life. Secondly, I've read the journal in question and it has grown to be one of my favorite journals. It's newer, its run by a college with an MFA program which has multiple literary journals, the work is intelligent, edgy, fun, etc. I've read 4 of the 5 issues thus far and even re-read one of the issues. I've kept each issue I've purchased. This leads me to my third point, what was it about my submission that gave the editors the impression that I was using a submission service. I only have three thoughts:

The poems sucked and/or they (i.e., the poems) didn't suit the tastes of the editors, and subsequently, they thought to themselves, and perhaps joked back and forth with their colleagues over PBR and pretzels, "this fucking jerk has never read Journal Name...if he had he wouldn't have sent such shit." You know, I realize not every editor's going to like my poetry and a few editors might even think my poetry sucks ass. I also realize this is how it works. And I'm okay with that. But why send me a letter accusing me of using a submission service. Why not just send me a generic rejection slip.
Something in my cover letter gave the preliminary reader the impression that I didn't prepare the submission myself. Now, I have to admit that my cover letters can be a little bland: I work here, I'm married to so-and-so, I have three kids, I live in KC, my poetry has appeared in Names of 3-5 Journals, and recycle the damn poems if you think they suck. I don't always mention the stellar poems I read in the journals latest issue, and in this case, I didn't name the poems I appreciated but I had in fact read 4 of the 5 issues of the journal. But again, why send me a letter accusing me of using a submission service when you have absolutely no evidence to support such a claim. Just send me a generic rejection slip. I could use it as a book mark when I read your next issue.
They made a mistake: they grabbed the "We don't read poems from writer's submission services" pile instead of the "your poems weren't right for us" pile. It's an easy mistake to make.

Now, perhaps there's something I'm missing but these three reasons seem like the most logical reasons.

So, now to a more important aspect of this wonderful event, which by the way has really got my panties in a bunch, the reality is that I prepare all of my submissions. I painstakingly fill envelope after envelope. I keep a database so that every submission is thoroughly tracked so that I make inquiries at the proper times, give journals plenty of response time given that it's a known fact that most journals (not all) are behind in their production schedule by at least 3-12 months, withdraw any poems that are accepted which I have submitted out simultaneously (to journals that accept simultaneous submissions), etc. I even have a huge database of journals with their guidelines, addresses, submission preferences (mail or electronic), sample copy costs, subscription costs, poetry editor names. I also update this database on a regular basis.

I want to be clear about this though; I am not upset about being rejected. Getting rejected is par for the course. I have submitted 836 groups out. I have had 80 journals publish 95 of my poems. That's an acceptance rate of 9.569377%. That means I get rejected 90.4% of the time. I guess you could say I'm better at loosing than winning; better at getting rejected than accepted...but who isn't...it's just part of the process.

What angers me the most is that a journal that I really respect would presume that I use a submission service...that is, if it wasn't a harmless mistake. Not only this but I'm familiar with and respect the work of 2 out of the 4 poetry editors: I've read their books and/or chapbooks. Anybody who knows me, knows that I read and write tirelessly and I work hard at researching and reading almost every journal I submit to (which I will add to in a few days when I provide a synopsis of my read journal to non read journal ratios).

I will perhaps, per Megan's suggestion, write a letter and/or e-mail to Name of Journal in an attempt to clear up things.

This is all I can say right now. And I'm trying to NOT mention the name of the journal.

Saturday Afternoon

2008-08-09T13:31:00.000-07:00

I'm at my parents in Marshalltown, Iowa. Megan, I, and the family decided to visit my parents before school starts for the boys. One thing is for certain thus far: I've seen way too many John McCain ads. I haven't seen any in Kansas City thus far but I've seen three so far today on NBC's local affiliate.

Tonight, we're having Zeno's Pizza. Travis and Hannah will be coming over. Megan and I might even catch a movie...probably Step Brothers (Will Ferrell rules). It will be a good night.

Happy Hour

2008-08-07T17:42:00.000-07:00

I read some more Weil today and this is what I have to share (it's from her section on evil in Gravity and Grace):

"A certain inferior kind of virtue is good's degraded image, of which we have to repent, and of which it is more difficult to repent than it is of evil--The Pharisee and the Publican."

I think she meant "The Pharisee and the RePublican" but I'm not sure since she wrote this in the early 1940's. But I like to think she meant "The Pharisee and the RePublican."

I'm going to Room 39 for a little happy hour tonight. Some of the regulars from the Main Street Rag reading series (a monthly reading series and open mic night at the Writer's Place), including the host Shawn Pavey hang out there on Late Nite happy hour nights.

Mary Biddinger has a great post on writing prompts. I like prompts especially when I'm in a slump and need to stretch a little bit.

Food Eater

2008-08-06T19:17:00.000-07:00

I was pondering my "creative conundrum" and figured out the problem: my fascination with NASCAR, Texas Roadhouse, WWE, etc. has morphed me into a mere "food eater." The only things that satisfy me are fast cars, meat, violence, and of course beer. I work only to consume. The literary arts no longer matter to me. Perhaps I should accept the inevitable. Of course this "thought train" is fairly prejudicial and maybe a tad guilty of stereotyping.

I honestly think the longer that I have been writing the less satisfied I am with my poetry. I'm not sure if this is a common experience but I don't think I'm entirely comfortable with my declining satisfaction. And I don't mean comfortable in the sit back, prop my feet up, sip a little single malt, and watch some Battlestar Galactica sense (although that's not all that bad) but in the sense that I'm willing to reconcile the "normal" evolution in any poets (or aspiring poets) creative life: namely that over time they become less and less satisfied with their work and have to make adjustments to their mental paradigms, writing habits, aesthetics, poetics, etc. to compensate for the evolution. Perhaps this is too rigid a view? Perhaps there is no such thing as the "normal evolution of less satisfaction" or perhaps I'm taking myself too seriously.

On a less serious note. First, I went to my office to write this morning. Megan was watching Project Runway and drinking coffee at 7:00 AM. The coffee was normal but Project Runway at 7:00 AM. I didn't write.

Secondly, my mere "food eater" comment reminded me of a story about one of my colleagues at the bank I "food eat" at. A few months ago he and I went out for sushi on pay day Friday: we call it pay day sushi. He told me over sushi that he was using he and his wife's stimulus check to buy his wife new boobs. He was serious. He added that if they got a divorce she would get one and he'd get one because he paid for them. He also added that the fact that he was buying his wife a boob job with their stimulus check gave a new meaning to the phrase stimulus package. I'm serious. She got the boob job. How does one respond especially while eating sushi.

Third, I'm going to be a featured reader at the Main Street Rag reading series which is hosted at The Writer's Place in KC every third Sunday of the month. So, Brandon if your reading this mark August 17th on your calendar. Otherwise...actually Brandon, you might be the only one who reads this blog.

Creative Conundrum

2008-08-05T19:17:00.000-07:00

I didn't write again today. To be honest, since May 2007 I've written 27 rough drafts. Of those 27 rough drafts, I only like 5, which were all written in 2007. This means I don't like anything I've written this year.

Now my rough drafts are not complete drafts. I usually take 2 days-2 months to finish a rough draft. I put the poem aside for a few weeks and then begin the long, arduous task of revising the poem which can mean 6-10 drafts or more. I feel it's complete when I feel like I can't go an further textually and when I read the poem aloud it reads smoothly. So, I have to feel comfortable with it textually and orally. Once I reach this comfortability I usually will start submitting the poem, along with others of course, to literary journals. Of course, I have often come back to poems years later to continue minor tweaking and sometimes major overhauls. I'm obsessive like that.

So, back to my original thought: writing has sucked for the past 14 months. I don't feel comfortable with what I'm writing. I feel like I'm writing less and less. And I'm not sure what to do about. Oddly, enough my creative conundrum started when Megan and I bought our new home which leads me to a question: how does 'writing space' or 'creative space' affect a poet's productivity as a writer or to put it less capitalistically: does the space in which a poet creates poetry affect the quality of their poetry??? Hmmm...inquiring minds want to know...as do I.

I ordered 8 more 1:64 scale NASCAR cars tonight. I like to believe they're for my son Brayden.

Tid Bits

2008-08-04T19:35:00.000-07:00

I suck at Farkle. My sons, Gavin and Elijah, essentially kick my ass every night in Farkle. Yes, every night we play games before bed except for Friday nights which is WWE Friday Night SmackDown and Saturday nights which is Naruto night.

I read a little more of Ben Lerner’s The Lichtenberg Figures (for the third time) at lunch as well as Simone Weil’s Gravity and Grace.

Recent downloads: The Moldy Peaches and Kimya Dawson. Yes, I downloaded them because of Juno, which is definitely a 4 out of 5 stars based on the Netflix rating scale, which is to say, I really like it. Michael Cera was…well…Michael Cera and he was brilliant as usual. Ellen Page was outstanding. I loved Jason Bateman. Even Jennifer Garner was pretty good.

FYI...I don't know what the fuck this blog is for.

Send/Receive

2008-08-04T19:33:00.000-07:00

I got up this morning and attempted to write. I desperately wanted to break out of a creative slump. But I was so exhausted all I could do was stare at the ceiling in my office. Typically when I get up early, take a shower, and get a cup of coffee in The Blue Moose mug I’m energized enough to sit down, listen to some music, and write. But this morning my mind was still hitting the snooze button. After a while I just sat there hitting the Send/Receive button in Outlook completely unaware of what I was doing. So, no go this morning. I feel like my “creative battery” is running low on juice and that I either need a jump start or a new battery and I’m not really sure what a new battery looks like. Regardless, I feel like I’ve been in a slump for 1 ½ years. I think its because of the damn dust mites. Megan thinks it’s because I’m lazy. The dust mites thinks it's because I don't read enough Jorie Graham.

Sunday Afternoon

2008-08-03T12:40:00.000-07:00

I’m watching NASCAR at Pocono on ESPN. Yes, I’m kind of dorky. And if watching racing wasn’t enough to reveal my “country” side, we went to Texas Roadhouse yesterday. I love their country fried sirloin and my kids love throwing peanut shells on the ground.

But I didn’t realize that the waitresses (and only the waitresses) were required line danced. No, it wasn’t anybody's birthday. There was no “happy birthday” song, cakes, etc. The waitresses cranked up Rednex’s “Cotton Eye Joe” and line danced in a front of dozens of patrons. They were very robotic and unsynchronized at first but by the time the song was done they were still robotic but much more synchronized.

It was surreal though; the waitresses had this “I didn’t sign up for those” look on their face that yielded the following internal monologue: “This is the ‘business is slow because the economy sucks’ line dance. Just keep grabbing your hips and twirling around. Look happy and dance, look happy and dance even though my tips are lower, profits are down 28.74%, and it costs me 19.32% more to drive to work because gas is going through the fucking roof. Just look happy and dance, just look happy and dance.” Of course, this is a very pessimistic monologue but I don’t care.

And that’s me on a Sunday afternoon: watching NASCAR with Ben Lerner’s The Lichtenberg Figures (I’m reading it for the third time…and I’m not sure why…probably because I like it) on my lap thinking about Texas Roadhouse while drinking Mountain Dew Code Red and occasionally flipping to Fox to check out a little Angels-Yankee’s action. What does this reveal about Jon Barrett?

Later, homemade macaroni and cheese with Brandon, Debbie, Paul, and Camilla, and of course my lovely family.

Ryan Adams

2008-04-18T19:01:00.000-07:00

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I listened to Ryan Adams' "The End" 37 times in the past 24 hours, of which 29 times were while I laid on my couch staring at the ceiling thinking NASCAR. I love the song: love it!!! The twangs, the slides. I also downloaded Heartbreaker. I really do immensely admire Ryan Adams' Jacksonville City Nights...most especially "The End." And I do have a sweet spot for NASCAR matchbox cars. I've bought 13 for my youngest son Brayden and I'll tell you which ones if you ask nicely.

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There's an open mic night this weekend at The Writer's Place celebrating the 40th anniversary of Jack Kerouac's On the Road. I'm not going...definitely not going. But I will be drinking whisky, triple Belgian ale, Russian lager, and watching Lost. All at the same time: I like whisky with a beer chaser. I also like fake centipedes but who's keeping track. 12 days since I last (blank)...I won't say 12 days since what...I'll leave that up to your imagination.

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Rejections to date: 740. Keep it up! Way to go! (whistles, hoots, hollers, more whistling, a couple winks...can't you tell I'm walking the red carpet in front of my adoring fans).

The Future

2008-03-31T18:42:00.000-07:00

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Five ways to go:

A caviling rant against "the scattered babblings" of drunken narcissists (a la Charles Bukowski wannabes: Yells, drunken slurred speech, Yells, Yells, drunken slurred speech, hush, hush, George Bush sucks, Yells, Yells, more drunken slurred speech...The End!)
A play-by-play commentary on WWE Monday Night Raw which my kids are watching with my wife right now (I think Rick Flar just retired...wow he's flabby!)
An essay on dismissiveness and the dangers of online dating services for dogs (MLA or APA???)
Engrandizing self-promotion and the endless search for self-fulfillment via knitting clubs("I just donated a scarf to the homeless shelter...my good deed for 2008 is done...now I must put a picture of 'homeless Bob' on the refrigerator wearing the scarf I made...here, I'll use my poetry magnets...perfect!")
Or none of the above.

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Rejections to date: 738. Today it was Southern California Review. I love rejections as much as I love Oreos and I just went through a package of Double Stuff Oreos with my wife in less than 48 hours: purchased at 7:16 pm on Saturday night.

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I finished Scientific American Reports' special edition on robots during lunch today. In the future I will control things with my mind via tiny microchips implanted in my brain. Seamlessly flip through channels on the television , control my robot vacuum cleaner, turn off the lights, turn on the microwave and warm up a bowl of Tomato soup, or perhaps even toast some Pop Tarts. Commanding robots by thought will be fun!

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Coming Attractions: thoughts on Pleiades, comments on Bredle's Standing In Line For the Beast, the side effects of Chantix, and what I keep in my top dresser drawer (which one: left, right, left, right). Fuck it, I'll stick to the first two.

Uneventful Weekend

2008-03-30T19:17:00.000-07:00

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Very, very uneventful weekend: watched Spongebob Square Pants with the kids, did laundry, played with cars and moon sand (I hate moon sand: it shows up everywhere), watched a little more Spongebob Square Pants, the boys played Lord of the Rings video game on Xbox, cleaned the kitchen and dog poop in the backyard, played baseball with the boys in the poop free yard (after buying whiffle balls, a new Easton Little League bat, and a glove for Gavin), beat my son twice in FIFA Soccer 2006 (I should have let him win...but I just couldn't), played UNO a lot, and much, much more. At night I drank Glenfiddich Single Malt Scotch (not the best whisky but it did the trick) and watched either Lost or Battlestar.

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I also finished Redivider (5.1). My favorites:

"Pathogenesis," Dan Pribble
"La Maison du Fada," Rebecca Hall
"Poor Yorick," Adrianna Ranta
both of Sue Standing's poems: "Deseret" and "Under the Sign Of"

I was also able to add one more book to my Book List. Sue Standing was published by Four Way Books back in 2003: False Horizon. Again, this is a little obsessive but I collect books based on publisher because I would rather have, for example, 10 Four Way Books books on my shelf so that I have a better feel for Four Way Books. Four Way Books happens to be on my "collect from this press list" and I have 12 titles in my office.

I don't like plithera of different individual titles from different presses spattered across my shelves. This is good because I believe I can gain a greater appreciation for individual presses but it can also be a bad thing because I procrastinate picking up individual titles with presses I'm not collecting currently. Which is why I break the rules from time to time or if I really want a specific book, like Michael Dumanis' My Soviet Union or James Allen Hall's Now You're Enemy I break down and buy 3-5 titles from U Mass Press or Univ of Arkansas Press. So, if anybody has any suggestions for poetry from U Mass Press or Univ of Arkansas Press I'm all ears. I have a small working list of authors but I'm not familiar with many of the poets published by both presses.

3

2008-03-25T18:49:00.000-07:00

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I accomplished my goal yesterday of submitting my poetry manuscript to 3 presses and/or contests in March. I have the same goal in April: it's time to develop thick skin with the manuscript. I've been rejected 737 times by journals so I've built up pretty thick with literary journals. But presses that publish chapbooks and book-length manuscripts is another beast. My manuscript took my 5 years to finish. I officially finished it in early March. I already hate it and loathe everything about it, which I hope is normal. But I now feel free to pursue new ideas, etc.

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I'm loving David Roderick's Blue Colonial: both wonderfully crafted and elegant.

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I hope to post "The Fat (Book Review #2 & 3)" in the next two weeks. The books: Jason Bredle's Standing In Line For The Beast and Kevin Prufer's National Anthem. It's not NewPages but I enjoy writing about other people's work.

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On deck tonight: New Belgium 1554 Brussels Style Black Ale and more Battlestar.

Lack

2008-03-22T08:32:00.000-07:00

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My writing life over the past week can be described with one word: lack. I went from writing everyday this month to not writing for a full week: very disappointing.

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I just finished Standing In Line For The Beast and have moved onto:

Jon Anderson, Day Moon (Carnegie Mellon)
David Roderick, Blue Colonial (APR/Honickman First Book Prize 2006, Copper Canyon Press)

They're both from a few years back but I've been looking forward to reading them for some time and those of you who know me know that I collect books by press. I'll buy 7-10 books at a time from a specific press as opposed to buying randomly or by author or new release. I like to support presses and get a feel for the larger body of work they're producing as opposed to single poets/authors here and there. It's a little obsessive as well...or uptight...take your pick. Plus I like uniformity on my bookshelf...which is pathetic.

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Battlestar was awesome last night. As was Lost's "Confidence Man." On to disc 3 from season 1 of Lost.

Weakness

2008-03-21T19:08:00.001-07:00

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I gave in to weakness today: I purchased Battlestar Galactic season 3. There was a delay with Netflix, Megan forgot to send back our movies 3 days in a row, and my brother-in-law and sister have disc 1. Obviously a recipe for jealousy and envy. I couldn't wait...I'm pathetic. And what's worse? I also bought Family Guy seasons 1 & 2 because they were on sale for $19.99. I thought it was a steal for 28 episodes. I was a sucker more like it; a perfect example of an impulse buyer. But you know what...I'm going to enjoy my weekend: Battlestar Galactica, Family Guy, Guinness, and a little Belgian ale to boot!!!

*
I got a poem accepted by The MeadoW today: one of the most professional journals I've dealt with thus far...and I've dealt with a lot.

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Rejections to date: 737.

Lost

2008-03-19T21:55:00.000-07:00

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I received contributors copies for both Out of Line and Buffalo Carp. Out of Line is a wonderful journal dedicated to social and political issues (i.e., social harmony and justice). Buffalo Carp is based out of the Quad Cities (i.e., Davenport and Bettendorf, IA, and Moline, Rock Island, and East Moline, IL). Dorothy Lasky appears in Buffalo Carp. I have Awe, her book from Wave Books, and am looking forward to reading it very soon. Both journals look great and I can't wait to dig in.

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I am officially hooked on Lost. I've put off watching Lost because I was a fan of Alias and J.J. Abrams' eventual proverbial "dropping of the ball" with that show made me hesitant about jumping into Lost. But all it took was the pilot episodes and I was hooked. So now Battlestar is competing with Lost in my Netflix que...oh the drama!

The Leprechauns

2008-03-17T18:42:00.000-07:00

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Last night Megan and I turned all of the furniture upside down and hung backpacks and book bags from the ceiling and spattered green things all over the living room: drums, bean bag frogs, pencils and pens, Starburst, Skittles, papier-mache, etc. We posted signs on the walls with "The Leprechauns were here!!!" scrawled in green magic marker. Our dog, Hawkeye freaked out. Our youngest son Brayden stood and stared. It didn't phase Gavin. He asked if he gets presents for St. Patrick's Day. Elijah was annoyed that he had to help turn the furniture back over. This didn't go over so well.

The other day, after the kids were freaked out by my Coyote story, Megan sent the kids outside to play. They hesitantly acquiesced...now slightly frightened by the beast in the woods. Megan proceeded to howl out the open window from behind the curtains. Our boys didn't know it was her. They made a mad dash for the porch and never looked back. Megan insisted it was a coyote or a werewolf and even showed them a mark on her neck that she swore might be a werewolf bite, which was actually just a zit. They believed her until she told them she was just kidding. They laughed but haven't been back to the backyard for over a week.

No Coffee #2

2008-03-15T17:33:00.000-07:00

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Megan, Paul, and I watched three episodes from Battlestar Galactica 2.5 last night. I’m trying to refresh myself before jumping in to season three. We watched “Pegasus: Extended Version,” “Resurrection Ship (Part 1),” and “Resurrection Ship (Part 2).” It was awesome and also contributed to a late start this morning.

*
We were out of coffee this morning which is bad news especially after drinking beer and single malt Scotch whisky last night. I am addicted to caffeine and I’m not ashamed to admit it. I got some coffee for Megan and me but it took a little longer than usual to feel normal this morning. Now I’m going to Target to do our monthly personal care/household shopping: toilet paper, tin foil, light bulbs, etc. Megan made the list and I’m doing the shopping. She’s doing the grocery shopping later this afternoon. We try to keep Sundays free of any running around, errands, work, etc.; as a result shopping, hair cuts, house work, chores, errands, etc. are done on Saturdays.

*
All of a sudden this afternoon, I started feeling sick: upset stomach, etc. Maybe it was something I ate…Large Starbucks coffee, two Cadbury mini creme eggs, honey ham sandwich with mustard and mayonnaise, garden salsa Sun chips, Pepsi, Skittles, and three glasses of ice water…I don’t really see what the big deal is…there’s nothing wrong with the aforementioned food…

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What I’ve been reading and listening to on my day off:
1421, Gavin Menzies
American Spikenard, Sarah Vap
Cold War Kids’ phenomenal album Robbers & Cowards

Worms

2008-03-14T19:16:00.001-07:00

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My youngest son, who's two, tried to eat a worm today. My oldest son, who's nine, found a grub. I told him it might be a screw worm and explained to him that screw worms get into animals via the nose, ear, or buttocks and eat them from the inside out until the animal dies. He dropped it and then looked at me with a grin and said, "No, it isn't!" and put it back in a Tupperware container full of mud, twigs, and leaves. I know...I'm an ass! My wife went to get a Culver's concrete Butterfingers mixer for herself and a Strawberry malt for me...she's very nice. After the malt comes single malt scotch whisky and a review of Battlestar Galactica Season 2.5.

734

2008-03-13T19:17:00.000-07:00

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Two weeks ago I sent out my poetry manuscript for the first time. A day later I already wanted to change the name and layout of the manuscript. Those who know me well are aware that I’ve obsessed over this manuscript for nearly five years. So my desire to change the title and layout will come as no surprise. I wish I could just let it go but I can’t: I'm constantly mulling over the poems, layout, order, quotes, epigraphs, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So, in the coming days I’m going to tinker with a handful of alternative titles. I already have the alternative layout ready (i.e., five sections instead of three—I like breathing room). I want to narrow down the possible titles so that I can submit the manuscript out to a few more contests and/or publishers. My goal is to send it out to three in March and three in April. I have sent it out to two contests thus far so I need one more submission to achieve my March objective. One thing I’ll say, on a side note and anybody who has sent out their manuscript can attest to this: it can get expensive quick.

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Things continue to get worse for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and thus the mortgage industry. According to Tami Luhby, a CNNMoney staff writer, “Investors are now shunning mortgage-backed securities issued by government sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which have been critical in keeping the real estate market from completely falling apart.” This is another reason why FHA may be the only viable option for some prospective and existing homeowners.

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Rejections to date: 734 (I miscalculated the other day)

Very Delicious

2008-03-12T19:26:00.000-07:00

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I work in banking and it looks like banks are headed towards 60’s and 70’s style lending, which is to say, if you don’t have a 720 credit score or greater than you either need 20% down, or your going to pay a lot in up front fees for the rate you get, or you need to go FHA. The banks are having difficulties securing funds by using mortgage backed securities as collateral and their losing a lot of money from bad subprime loans and ALT loans that were originated during the hay day and weren’t backed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac so if you don’t have stellar credit than FHA is the only safe bet for the time being. Fun times ahead. Fun times ahead. Needless to say, business is slow and frustrating.

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I went to Barnes & Nobles for lunch and had some Chicken and Wild Rice soup: very delicious. And when I finished read about half of Jason Bredle’s Standing In Line For The Beast: also very delicious.

No Coffee

2008-03-12T06:30:00.000-07:00

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Our coffee maker didn't work this morning, which means my whole writing routine was thrown off and also means I impulsively went to Starbucks to get Megan and I some coffee. Normally if we get coffee, we get it from either Broadway Coffee or The Roasterie, which are two locally owned and operated coffee shops. But drastic times call for drastic measures. And when I say coffee, I mean coffee not a double caramel cappuccino with skim milk and whip cream on top...but a real house coffee. I'm not sure why people say, "I'm going to get a coffee" and return with a foo-foo drink...not that I'm a coffee snob...but I'm just saying...it's time for work.

Carnivore in the Woods

2008-03-11T17:31:00.000-07:00

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What I’ve been listening to recently while I write in the mornings: Beirut’s The Flying Club Cup. Beirut is great music to wake up to while sipping a cup of crappy coffee.

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I need to check out Get Him Eat Him.

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I think we have a coyote or another carnivore in the woods behind our house. We live in what would be classified as an urban part of Kansas City but there’s a small wooded area behind our house. Last night, per my evening routine, I let the dog out and sat on porch with a glass of Aberlour single malt Scotch whisky.

Our Boston terrier, Hawkeye (named in honor of the Iowa Hawkeye’s and our beloved Hawkeye state), flipped out: he ran to the back fence and an animal ran back and forth on the other side of the fence. So, of course he chased it but it was about 2 times the size of Hawkeye. I got him inside as quickly as possible because he’s mentally challenged and wouldn’t stand a chance against a larger animal.

Once he was inside I heard an eruption of cat-like screeches, hisses, grunting, clawing, and crying emanating from the woods. It sounded like an “all-out-alley-cat-war” but far more brutal. It went on for approximately a minute or so before the crying sound got louder and louder. It sounded like a wounded animal. Then there was another round of screeches, hisses, grunting, and crying followed by silence. Two or three minutes passed before the silence was broken by the sound of an animal chewing, chomping, biting, etc. It sounded like it was gnawing on bone and tearing flesh. It was like Animal Planet in my backyard. Megan said I should go check it out. I didn’t because I’m a coward. She said she’s adventurous and brave, and I’m a wimp. I drank more whisky.

*
I work in a bank building next door to a Planned Parenthood: the same Planned Parenthood that has monthly visits from the local media because of Johnson County District Attorney (a rabid-right-to-lifer) Phill Kline’s attempt to bring charges of illegal late term abortions, among other charges, against the Overland Park Planned Parenthood. The sidewalks in front of the Planned Parenthood are frequently filled by local church groups, Christians, etc. They pray…mostly. And a few wear red tap Xed across their mouth as a symbol of protest. I can only imagine it represents to voiceless aborted and perhaps the red stands for innocent blood…I’m really not sure.

I consider myself a Christian. I attend church almost every Sunday. I was raised in an Evangelical Charismatic church. I even worked full time as a youth pastor for 5 years from age 21-26. So, I understand “why” they are praying and protesting. What I don’t understand is how they can reconcile their actions with Jesus’ instructions on how Christians ought to pray in Matthew 6:5-8, which states: "And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him."

I realize there’s context involved in any exegesis of a biblical text. But there are biblical principles that can be ascertained as an explanation for how Christians or follower’s of Jesus should behave morally, ethically, religiously, etc.

I don’t mean to imply that they don’t have the right to stand against abortion because it is their right to speak freely. But when one reflects on Matthew 6:5-8 and then watches their very public prayer that quite literally takes place on a street corner I can’t help but wonder how they can their public prayer with Jesus’ admonishment to prayer in secret to avoid showy expressions of “charity” and “prayer.”

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William D. Waltz’s Zoo Music from Slope Editions came in the mail today. I’m going to read it as soon as I’m finished with Jason Bredle’s Standing In Line For the Beast and Sarah Vap’s American Spikenard.

Downloads, Season 3

2008-03-10T17:01:00.000-07:00

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Downloads from the weekend:

The National, Boxer
Sufjan Stevens, Greetings from Michigan: The Great Lake State
Neutral Milk Hotel, The Aeroplane, Over the Sea
Neutral Milk Hotel, On Avery Island

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Eight days until Battlestar Galactica Season 3 is released on DVD. I moved Season 2.5 to the top of my Netflix que so that I can get refreshed before watching Season 3. It has been over a 9 months since I finished Season 2.5, and unfortunately, I didn’t have cable when Season 3 aired. But the wait is almost over and I can’t wait.

Bourbon Stout

2008-03-09T20:16:00.000-07:00

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Megan and I went to the 75^th Street Brewery last night. I had country fried steak with garlic mashed potatoes and garlic green beans: it was superb; although the country fried steak was more “fried” than “steak.” Megan had fish and chips, which she also said was wonderful. I had two pints of American ale and a small glass of imperial bourbon stout which was one of the best, if not the best, stout I’ve ever had. It was smooth with a little hint of bourbon. I drank it a little fast though which contributed to an upset stomach later.

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I am currently reading or have just finished the following books and journals:

American Spikenard, Sarah Vap
The Green Girls, John Blair
Becoming the Villainess, Jeanine Hall Gailey
Fa(r)ther Down: Songs from the Allergy Trials, Arielle Greenberg
Practice: New Writing + Art
Greatcoat

I highly recommend Practice and Greatcoat. Check them out: they're both new(er).

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I also had the pleasure of hearing Natasha Tretheway read for the Midwest Poets Series at Rockhurst University this past Thursday. She was very, very friendly after the reading. I very rarely purchase books at readings and even more rarely get them signed. But I picked up Native Guard (paper back of course) and had her sign it. Great reading with a pretty hefty turnout. The only sour note(s): with the flu going around KC there was a constant cacophony of coughs, and of course, a woman sitting behind me forgot to turn her cell phone off so it chirped a few times during the reading.

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Rejections to date: 721. Is that a lot? I think it's hot!