In the process of writing maybe brand is in the background somewhere but after a while it seems to me the author is branded. What are blurbs but a brand? I often glance at the blurbs for names/brands (shameful I know). Not to rule out the book completely. But if Dana Gioia blurbs a book… Read more

I am floored. Moved. Excited. Yes Yes Yes. There goes my head. I am alive. Check out K. Silem Mohammad’s electronic chapbook: <a href="http://www.durationpress.com/bookstore “>Duration Press The only way out is in since the out has already been appropriated by the in. In other words, I agree with <a href="http://ronsilliman.blogspot.com/&quot; >Silliman’s defense of branding. At… Read more

From the intro to the Portable Beat Reader: “Earlier in the history of American literature, the novelist Henry James acknowledged in his biography of Nathaniel Hawthorne that “the best things come, as a general thing, from the talents that are members of a group; every works better when he has companions working in the same… Read more

Anyone else feel like they make decisions as all or nothing. I get rid of a lot of books in order to trade for books I want (trying to build my own canon) but I sometimes regret getting rid of some books. I am in that mode right now. Tempted to get rid of Levine… Read more

This is my first year with March madness even though I have lived in the States for quite some time now. The Air Force/Carolina game last night was great. A push and pull. Play my kind of game no play mine. Slow fast slow fast. Eventually fast one (thank god). I’m currently 12th in the… Read more

My students connected much more to the innovative poetry than the traditional in my Irish Lit. class. I played Seamus Heaney for 20 min. Then some audio of Gabe Gudding reading from a Defense of Poetry, then Mairéad Byrne’s “The Pillar” and Randolph Healy’s “Daylight Savings Sex.” Almost all of my students have not read… Read more

For outness is but the feeling of otherness (alterity) rendered intuitive, or alterity visually represented. –Coleridge. Just purchased Tony Tost’s <a href="http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?inkey=62-0807129658-0&quot; >Invisible Bride last night. I’m only a little ways in, but I am hooked and altered. The alterity in Invisible Bride feels genuine. What I mean is I got some serious head chills.… Read more

In my Irish lit class I am teaching from the penguin book of contemp. poetry. The usual poets. I am bored. So I logged onto the internet and played some poems in real audio of Lisa Jarnot and Wanda Coleman. A little talk about tradition and innovation. Students were shocked by Lisa Jarnot. Who’s emp.… Read more

Gotta guest teach an undergrad beginning poetry workshop in half an hour. Not sure what I’m going to say. All the poems are very stale, boring, cliched. Gotta talk about the difference between writing out your feelings in a journal and writing a poem. Not that a combo of journal/blogging and other types of discourse… Read more

Not sure about TV on the Radio. Some songs were quite interesting. My friends were not impressed. One friend said, “Fishbone meets Grateful Dead.” Another said, “a new and improved punkier version of Hootie and the Blowfish. A third good friend said, “Gimmick. All gimmick.” The gimmick comment stuck. What distinguishes a gimmick? Innovation as… Read more

Going to see TV on the Radio tonight in Greensboro. I don’t have their cd. Only heard “staring at the sun.” I’ve heard good things about them. Hope they put on a jolly good show. Also going to see Leo/Pharmacists at GO! on Sunday. Good week to rock. Read more

Just ran across an ad in APR for the new and improved poetry magazine with Pound’s “make it new” a crazy photograph of an electrified woman, and a quote from August Kleinzahler about poetry magazine being wide awake with its new editor. The new issue has a bunch of poems by Bill Knot. The latest… Read more

Aaron McCollough has a very thought provoking response to Ron’s poetry test. The rapid response (myself included) to Ron’s poetry test seemed in part motivated by approval. How smart can I sound so Ron will like me? Does Ron ever read my blog? The Patchen poem Aaron looks at is a very interesting example. I… Read more

I picked up Joshua Clover’s Madonna anno domini. I hope to grab a copy of Joshua Corey’s Selah in the near future. It’s the c and the o. I’ll have to take a taste test of Selah and Madonna anno domini. Read more

Traded in some Pinsky, some Steve Orlen, some Don Delillo, some Stephen Dobyns, some Thomas Lux at The Bookshop in Chapel Hill. In exchange I picked up: Philip Whalen’s Decompressions Gregory Corso’s Mindfield Denise Levertov’s O Taste and See Clark Coolidge’s Own Face Josh Corey’s Madonna anno domini I’m building here. Trade out old tastes… Read more

I was fascinated by the responses on Ron Silliman’s blog to the poetry test. The attempt to focus on the work of a writer is sometimes an attempt to increase the credability of the writer in question. Thereby increasing artistic capital. Does Ann Carson’s short short bio increase her artistic capital? Does the mystery surrounding… Read more

We question the gatekeepers and if what they are guarding is worth the entry fee. Can we get rid of the gatekeepers? I’m suspicious of gatekeepers because I am often denied entry. So often I hear it’s harder to make sense, speak clearly than speak/write cryptic. It’s the old text/reader/writer (Mr. Aristotle’s rhetorical triangle). Get… Read more

So far I’ve spent $50 from Mr. Bush’s tax return on small press poetry and indie music. I am very excited by Wild Honey Press Ordered: Blackwards by Rosmarie Waldrop ($5.00 USD) Daylight Saving Sex by Randolph Healy ($5.00 USD) Shipping and Handling: $2.50 USD Total: $12.50 USD $12.50 for two books from the other… Read more

Mini vacation to Chapel Hill yesterday. Art musuem at UNC then The bookshop. Found about 16 books I wanted. Ended up getting: A Paradise of Poets by Jerome Rothenberg Voice Over by Elaine Equi Lit by Ron Silliman The Happy Birthday of Death by Gregory Corso (with a nice little fold out poem) really digging… Read more

Rainy and sticky with lots of birds right now. I slept well. Watched American Splendor. I need to find some underground comics. I haven’t read comics since I was a little in Ireland. Loved Ajax. Traded Bob Hicok for the revised and enlarged selected Robert Duncan edited by robert j. bertholf. Play at hand: 1)… Read more

Returning Bob Hicok. He bored me after six poems. Per the suggestion of Aaron McCollough, I am going to order Shanna Compton’s Down Spooky. Liked the audio of “We the blind need pushing.” Picked up Sleeping with the Dictionary. I am very excited. Got a serious roll. Sacked the headmaster for a monkey. Post Date: Fri… Read more

Wondering about the head/intellect. It’s all up there, but is it useful to pretend the ‘ole heart is something else? (All of a sudden I feel like that main character from Sex and the City typing on her mac). Playground tactics. Original tactics not like the rabbit in a hat trick. <a href="javascript:SquawkBoxPopup()” title=”Comments by… Read more

reread Tony Tost’s Disarm the settlers at Typo and thinking about programs. My cousin visitied from Ireland two summers ago and found it really strange we kept introducing people as: this is so and so, he’s from the program. Which reminds of: the church. The church says. . . As if everyone belonged to the… Read more

I am really digging Berstein’s “Artifice of Absorption.” I read parts of it a while back, but I wasn’t ready. Berstein says/writes: “Antiabsorptive does not necessarily mean nonentertaining . . . readers can be expected to enjoy a device that ruptures the commodification of reading insofar as this fulfills their desire for such a work.”… Read more

innovation, difference, and process become part of the machine of capitalism. The new, innovative food processor from GE etc. How can the new get over its specialness? I picked up Charles Bernstein’s A Poetics at the used book store and Insomnia Diary by Bob Hicok. I’ve only read four pages of Bernstein and it’s really… Read more

The local indep. music store (gate city noise) sent out an emergency email. They could go under in less than a month. So a big group of writers spent money on good music. I picked up: The Flaming Lips (The Soft Bulletin) Ted Leo/Pharmacists (The Tyranny of Distance) Califone (Heron King BLVES) The Wrens (Meadowlands)… Read more

Reading a Frank Bidart interview from Chicago Review (fall 2001). He talks about how irony can be a kind of “sophicated armored writing.” Bidart says, “I like extreme art. So much middle of the road art is simply boring . . . sophisticated armored writing feels very middle of the road to me. Aping the… Read more

Is honest searching for difference different than sinister specialness. When does specialness become sinister. Is it possible for extreme individualism to screw up a society? Maybe what I mean is beside the point rather than the point. (Ha. I’m clever. I’m special. I’m unique. I’m me. etc.) I worry about difference daily. And community. I… Read more

How can we know our victories? I hear a lot of complaints about the Iowa poets (I have participated sometimes) from the 1970’s. A kind of McPoem (ala Mr. Hall) narrative, easily digested etc. Now Iowa is on the other side. Mostly avant guarde inspired/influenced poetry. Iowa has power. Iowa is bringing the avant strategies… Read more

Wondering and worrying audience. The creation of audience versus the packaging of poetry for an audience. Writing for other poets versus writing for????? Sometimes non-readers of poetry (close friends) say they feel unintelligent because they don’t get process oriented poetry. I don’t want anyone to feel stupid and unworthy, including myself. I am driven to… Read more

Lorca’s “Imagination, Inspiration, Evasion” Reading a little Lorca in Jubilat #7 today. Lorca: “no one should say this is clear, because poetry is obscure. And no one should say this is obscure, because poetry is clear. . . we need to have forgotten poetry completely before it call fall naked into our arms.” I suppose… Read more

American Poetry acccording to a few hundred students at UNCG: Most students in four different classes had friends who wrote poetry and read at coffee shops. Quite a few thought a poet was polite, agreeable. A nice dinner guest. Only a few thought of a poet as crazy and dangerous (we were discussing the Irish… Read more

What is the relationship between retire and tire? For and between also interest me. If I am between Irish nationalism and cosmopolitanism what am I for? or (as the small stirs indicate almost to the point of a dead horse) If I am between language as multivocal, flux filled, slidding, anxiety ridden and language as… Read more

Swimming underwater today with head cold. I’ve been thinking a lot about period styles (conversational narrative etc.) Sebastian Matthews came last week and read some poems and part of the memoir. Did not enjoy it. William Matthews is ok, but not very interesting. I am not sure why (other than recognition, status as son of… Read more

I am looking at: a nice color plate of Dali’s Night and Day Clothes and listening to: Bonnie Prince Billy’s “wolf among wolves.” The combination is moving me. juxtapositions that buzz. Snow on the ground. Cold fingers. I don’t have to teach today because of the ice. Cuddle up to Dali, Bonnie prince billy, an… Read more

Gotta read Yeats “The Twisting of the Rope” and prepare a lesson plan for it. A little Celtic Twilight lecture perhaps. Listening to Czech music. Jaromir Hohavica and Kapela. I am wondering about poetry and performance after listening to Craig Arnold the other day. I like poetry read well, or well read poetry, but sometimes… Read more

The Boy with the Arab Strap Sleep the clock around kicks in the joy. A cup of coffee. re-reading Palmer’s At Passages. He is so amazing. Going to hear Craig Arnold read at 2pm today. Haven’t read any of his poems before. He’s one of those Yale winners. Daddy long legs. Useless jaws. Sometimes I… Read more

Boy with the arab strap is working for me this morning. Been thinking of ways I don’t want to go: 1) Foaming at the mouth 2) With a priest hovering over me 3)Tubes and a breathing machine 4) Unaware (i.e. out of my mind) 5) gun shot to head 6) hanging 7) gutting 8) electric… Read more

Thin SASE in the mail yesterday. Thought: another rejection. But it was an acceptance from Conduit. happy evening. happy morning. Read more

So the mac version of blogger is different. Not a split window. Maybe nicer. Watched Lost in Translation last night. I enjoyed it quite a bit. The inaudible whisper near the end. Most of the movie uses gestures more than conversation. Emotion is lost in translation from movie to audience. Which came first, the emotion/experience… Read more

Neck Popping feels good in the morning after a night of gorging on brick oven pizza, Guinness, Genache, coffee. Watched In America last night. Felt quite familiar. I came to America at the age of 12 from N. Ireland. It was 1985. Breakdancing was big. My preconception of America was built around movies (of course).… Read more

Moses and the wine part two. Or Jesus, the camel, and the death of fatherhood. If wavering is to stray then the narrow road requires flexible horses to get through the eye of the needle. If home is an interior then not home is . . . What a strange, profound, bewildering wilderness We invented… Read more

Some Fragments soon to be made whole At the thumbshow my lover parades like a peacock. The minions are swept off their feet. Ash in the throat. Clean wind is the cosolation of my future. My lot behind twelve million clomping hooves. It behooves you to bereave with bandits. Glaciers recommended their services but brisk… Read more

Consciousness without reason? If consciousness requires reason, then before the Greeks invented reason, no one was conscious? (William Barrett’s argument in Irrational Man) I am struggling to understand and define the illogical in language. Is language inherently logical? Language and magic. Language before deconstruction. However, language is always already there. So to think of the… Read more

So, some great new books for christmas: Allen Grossman, The Long Classroom and How to Do Things with Tears and Of the Great House Joyelle McSweeney, The Red Bird Barbara Guest, The Location of Things, Archaics, The Open Skies Best American 2002 (curious. Got it for $2) Edward Dorn, Gunslinger Octavio Paz, A Draft of… Read more

Dream 1: Stuck in a village in the middle of the desert. The village resembles the salt lake city shopping village. White church in the hills. The village is full of prisoners and I am one of them. I ask around and no one knows how we got here. The guards do not know how… Read more

Purchased an old imac (233, 160mb ram). I hope it works well when it arrives. Tired of laptops. Pulled in by the marketing/design of the old imacs. The macs are artistic outsiders. Form and content not seperate for the mac (for pc it’s all content, form is secondary). So very ugly mass produced pc’s. So… Read more

Went to a used bookstore today. I can’t seem to stay away. Almost always overwhelmed by boring poetry section. Then again in the last few weeks I did pick up: Nice to See You (Homage to Ted Berrigan) $2 The Dada Market (anthology) $4 Routine Distortions (Kenward Elmslie) $5 Mercurochrome (Wanda Coleman) $5 Charles Simic… Read more

Implied narrative. Everything has an implied narrative. That’s what I hear. Some narratives are more implied than others. How do implied narratives within lyric poetry work differently than linear, straightforward narratives. Subjectivity? The energy of image. Image is static. Does not move much outside the poem. How to light up images, make them move. Rhetoric,… Read more

“Images are not ideas, they are stiller than that, with less implication outside themselves.” (Robert Hass). Read more

A t.v. show called “Jim’ll Fix It.” Boys and girls wrote letters to Jim explaining their fantasies like drinking a fresh bottle of milk while riding upside down in a roller coaster. Other winners included eating forty different kinds of cheese at a factory in the midlands and singing with the whales in the Baltic… Read more