Poetry & Poets in Rags

Dear Poetry Aficionados,

Poetry & Poets in Rags

Girls on top. Congratulations to Laura Polley and Sarah Sloat, poets at Desert Moon Review's poetry board. Their poetry took first and second place in September's InterBoard Poetry Competition. Rounding out the top finishers is About Poetry Forum's Bill Brando. Honorable Mentions go to Bernard Henrie of The Writers Block, Rich Stewart of The Town, and Eric Linden of Mosaic Musings.

Thanks to esteemed poet Deborah Bogen for coming through once again for IBPC. She is a terrific reader, and her commentary is most definitely worth a click: IBPC: Latest Commentary.

In Poetry & Poets in Rags this week, it's boys on top, and Jack Kerouac leads the way. A couple wonderful articles, that complement each other are one-two. There will be more coming on him next week, as September 2007 and the 50th anniversary of the publication of "On the Road" comes to an end. It's been an extraordinary world-wide event, and I have been very please to be able to link to what will be oft-cited articles for our posterity to refer to, as they come to understand more fully how we got them to where they will find themselves.

Many more worthy articles and poems for your perusal. Be sure to scroll into Great Regulars. There is some fun stuff in there this week. One I couldn't help including is by John Timpane, on kissing. Another fun one is by David Kirby, who judged IBPC one year ago this coming three-month term. Upcoming for IBPC will be E. Ethelbert Miller for October through December. Check out his interview in Great Regulars as well.

Thanks for clicking in.

Yours,
Rus

Our links:

IBPC: Poetry & Poets in Rags

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Rus Bowden · at 7:38 PM

the trips in "On the Road" were made for the purpose of writing "On the Road." The motive was not tourism or escape; it was literature.

In fact, Kerouac began the book before his first trip with Cassady, which they took in the winter of 1948-49.

from The New Yorker: Drive, He Wrote

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Rus Bowden · at 7:35 PM

from the inevitable future, time bombs woven into our very DNA--are with us even when we're at our most transcendent. If, in some sense, that's a form of failure, it's the same failure we all face, the failure to sustain ourselves in the face of eternity, to build a firewall against the void. No one ever tried harder [than Kerouac]--making his friends into mythic figures, turning his adventures into heroic legends, creating a cosmology around the essence of the self.

from Bookforum: Roamin' Legions

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Rus Bowden · at 7:34 PM

was most glaringly captured when the TV stations of both Hamas and Fatah threw their support behind the unsuspecting Tamim [Al-Barghouti], broadcasting his poems repeatedly, and urging people to vote for him, catapulting him from a little-known young poet into a symbol of national resistance and unity.

from 3 Quarks Daily: Arab poetry's sometimes subversive answer to "American Idol"

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Rus Bowden · at 7:33 PM

is a brief history of coinage. It is also a meditation on our need for certainty, for truth worthy of a capital T. Not least, it is a wonderful cascade of sounds and images:

"Their misshapenness strikes the table in tiny splashes,/like still-cooling splatters of silver. Stater and shekel,/mina and obol. Persia's bullion had a lion and bull."

from The Seattle Times: "Bestov, schmestov," but these poems are pretty darned good

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Rus Bowden · at 7:32 PM

that we lose in life. That's one of the functions, anyway. Maybe all poems are responses to something we're missing. I think a lot of painters, for example, are like that. What they want to see isn't there, so they paint it. Anyway, this poem was certainly an example."

from The Day: The Latest 'Frame' [--J.D. McClatchy]

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Rus Bowden · at 7:30 PM

that we have to be told, in the face of substantial evidence to the contrary, that the detainees at Guantanamo Bay are perfect innocents. To now be lectured that their militant calls for jihad and their vulgar imprecations against America are also great poetry is an insult to basic intelligence quite beyond the pale.

from FrontPage Magazine: Poems from Guantanamo

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Rus Bowden · at 7:29 PM

Penguin had acted "professionally and ethically" throughout, he did admit: "I think it would have been more appropriate to have given some attribution to Mr [Stuart] Silverstein for those poems; it's just a personal opinion that I have based on my reading of the situation subsequent to my deposition in the initial case here."

from Telegraph: Penguin's in a flap over Dorothy Parker

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Rus Bowden · at 7:27 PM

by the New Yorker had a magical aspect," he [Paul Muldoon] said. "To see a poem published there had a magical aspect. To open up the magazine each week and see what the poem selection might be has a magical aspect, and I want to be part of that magic."

from The Daily Princetonian: Muldoon to be editor at New Yorker

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Rus Bowden · at 7:26 PM

of it being magical is it is imbedded in such a great deal of hard work and willingness to tolerate frustration and failure," [Kay] Ryan says. " I mean you have to have a great capacity for failure to write, and a great capacity for humiliation."

from Marin Independent Journal: Kay Ryan rises to the top despite her refusal to compromise

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Rus Bowden · at 7:24 PM

their rights in the name of tradition will obviously oppose me; those who wish to remain in the darkness of superstitions and religious blindness will obviously oppose me. I have seen that attitude in all fundamentalists; be it Christian, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish, whatever, it is the same." [--Taslima Nasreen]

from World Socialist Web Site: Bengali writer, Taslima Nasreen assaulted by mob led by Indian legislators

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Rus Bowden · at 7:22 PM

Hell, the soul, and eternal salvation or redemption, the theological stakes seem more local and temporal: "So teach us to number our days." Psalm 23, again, is greatly refreshed by translation. Everything is clearer, seeming to have been rinsed not in the baptismal water of the New Testament but in the life-giving water of the desert.

from The New Yorker: Desert Storm

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Rus Bowden · at 6:39 PM

in Kansas City is timely in another respect, too: The American Library Association's Banned Books Week begins Sept. 29, providing an annual reminder that there always seems to be someone out there who thinks the written word is dangerous, seditious, morally bankrupt, filthy or whatever.

from John Mark Eberhart: The Kansas City Star: Beware: The written word has been on trial

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Rus Bowden · at 6:34 PM

He ran to the room of his son, the painter Horace Vernet. "Horace! Horace! Come here."

"What is it?"

"We're all in tears!"

"Why, what's happened?"

"It's Monsieur Berlioz singing Gluck. Yes, monsieur," he said to Berlioz, "it's enough to lay one flat . . ."

from James Fenton: The Guardian: Left hand Gluck

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Rus Bowden · at 6:32 PM

in a court battle over conducting high-intensity sonar tests off Southern California's coast. On Aug. 30, a federal appeals panel--the first of two such panels to hear the case--voted 2-1 that testing may continue because of prevailing national security interests, despite a possible threat to marine mammals, including whales and dolphins.

from John Freeman: The Log: Navy Gets Go-Ahead for Offshore Sonar Tests

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Rus Bowden · at 6:31 PM

offers further evidence that the speaker is possibly so drunk that his thoughts and memories are misaligned: "Every street lamp that I pass/Beats like a fatalistic drum." It's no doubt the speaker's head that is beating like the "fatalistic drum."

from Linda Sue Grimes: Suite101.com: Eliot's Rhapsody on a Windy Night

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The main theme in Larkin's "Here" is suggested in the last three lines of the third stanza and the first line and a half in the fourth stanza: "And out beyond its mortgaged half-built edges/Fast-shadowed wheat-fields, running high as hedges,/Isolate villages, where removed lives//Loneliness clarifies. Here silence stands/Like heat."

from Linda Sue Grimes: Suite101.com: Philip Larkin's 'Here'

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This distinction indicates that the speaker is not referring to physical distance; he is not on a journey and separated from another person. He is separated from his God-given talent by writer's block. As day and night conspire to keep him tired and his creative juices blocked, he feels each day adds an additional weight of separation from his beloved duty of writing.

from Linda Sue Grimes: Suite101.com: Shakespeare Sonnet 28

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Those victors do not understand victory as well as the defeated understand it.

The speaker here exaggerates the notion of the defeated by saying they lay "dying"--this exaggeration is one of the reasons that readers may misunderstand and claim that the speaker is referring to a Civil War battle.

from Linda Sue Grimes: Suite101.com: 'Success is counted sweetest'

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Rus Bowden · at 6:29 PM

be treated with respect. What is heard cannot be unheard, what is read cannot be unread; thoughtful responsibility travels with the use of words.

from Frieda Hughes: The Times: Wearing down to shreds

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Rus Bowden · at 6:27 PM

by Kay Ryan, from Say Uncle: Poems.

from Garrison Keillor: The Writer's Almanac: For the week of September 24, 2007

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Rus Bowden · at 6:25 PM

"The Postman Always Rings Once," Dickens's "The Tale of One City," and Virginia Woolf's "About Halfway to the Lighthouse, More or Less."

These new releases might still prove too trying for the average reader, though. Are four Karamazov brothers too many for you? How about just "Dmitri Karamazov"? (He was always my favorite.)

from David Kirby: The Christian Science Monitor: How to Get People to Read the Classics

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Rus Bowden · at 6:23 PM

at describing places and the people who inhabit them. Galway Kinnell's great poem, "The Avenue Bearing the Initial of Christ into the New World" is one of those masterpieces, and there are many others. Here Anne Pierson Wiese, winner of the Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets, adds to that tradition.

Columbus Park

from Ted Kooser: American Life in Poetry: Column 130

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Rus Bowden · at 6:20 PM

Over time I came to understand that it is not that one should not write about people "outside" their own category, but that the necessary order of the work is to first examine the relationship one has to others, as honestly and fully as one can, and that this can happen, in part, in the process of writing. [--Anya Achtenberg]

from E. Ethelbert Miller: Foreign Policy in Focus: Fiesta!: Interview with Anya Achtenberg

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Rus Bowden · at 6:17 PM

that formulation fits well into the diverse society that we inhabit, but because Dylan is good enough to be called the heir to (several) great traditions as well as an artist speaking about recognisably "modern times".

"I consider myself a poet first and a musician second," he once said.

from Andrew Motion: The Times: Andrew Motion explains why Bob Dylan's lyrics should be studied in schools

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Rus Bowden · at 6:15 PM

Is death the annihilation of an individual consciousness, or does it lead to something else? And, in a universe that is incalculably large, what does the death of one mere person--a single human--signify? How could it not mean something?

from Meghan O'Rourke: Slate: Wrinkles in Time: Rereading Madeleine L'Engle

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Rus Bowden · at 6:14 PM

writes Gerard Manley Hopkins in his poem "Pied Beauty," and "Love has pitched his mansion in/The place of excrement," says William Butler Yeats's character in "Crazy Jane Talks with the Bishop." Cate Marvin begins her exhilarating, fierce new book with a poem in that tradition of embracing the foul with the fair.

from Robert Pinsky: The Washington Post: Poet's Choice

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Rus Bowden · at 6:12 PM

of most of that. And perhaps that's best and it would ruin the moment to be thinking, mid-kiss, "OK, I give Ease of Embrace a 7.3, Scent is a nice 8.0, and while Moistness is a 3.6 (too sloppy by half), I'm getting a big 9.7 on Inter-Lip Conformation." People just don't do that. Still, they are doing more than they realize.

from John Timpane: The Courant: Kiss And Tell

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Rus Bowden · at 6:09 PM

GT features the work of Joseph Millar, the author of "Fortune," published by Eastern Washington University Press. His first book, "Overtime," (EWU, 2001), was a finalist for the Oregon Book Award. He spent 25 years in the East Bay working as a telephone installation foreman. He now lives in Eugene, Ore., and teaches at Pacific University's Low Residency MFA Program.

Lyrical

from Good Times Weekly: Poetry Corner: Poetry by Joseph Millar

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Rus Bowden · at 6:07 PM

by Dennis O'Driscoll

from The Guardian: The Saturday poem: Ever After by Dennis O'Driscoll

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Rus Bowden · at 6:02 PM

by Deborah Warren

from The New Yorker: Poetry: Dream with Flowers and Bowl of Fruit

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Living
by Jason Shinder

from The New Yorker: Poetry: Living

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Rus Bowden · at 6:00 PM

[by Harry Griswold]

from The Oregonian: Poetry

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Rus Bowden · at 5:52 PM

Van Zant Elementary School

My life is like the beach waves

from The Philadelphia Inquirer: Your Poem: [by Lily Kristina Feldman]

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By Audrey Alyse Jenkins

Of Death

from The Philadelphia Inquirer: Your Poem: [by Audrey Alyse Jenkins]

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By Damon Lomax
Delsea Regional High School

We'll Find A Way (Never Give Up)

from The Philadelphia Inquirer: Your Poem: [by Damon Lomax]

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By Shreya Patel

The Colors of the Rainbow

from The Philadelphia Inquirer: Your Poem: [by Shreya Patel]

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Rus Bowden · at 5:51 PM

[by Warren Le Mon]

from Portsmouth Herald News: Poem: To Enzi

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The Wild Vine
[by G. G. Malloy]

from Portsmouth Herald News: Poem: The Wild Vine

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Rus Bowden · at 5:50 PM

the Gossamer Depictions of the Women of Certain Southern Texts"
By Adrian Blevins

from Slate: "Poem for My Daughter Disparaging the Gossamer Depictions of the Women of Certain Southern Texts" --By Adrian Blevins

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Rus Bowden · at 5:48 PM

has published five further volumes. For eight years he was poetry editor at Faber; he now teaches at the University of Hull. His edition of the Letters of Ted Hughes is forthcoming.

The naive reader

from The Times Literary Supplement: The Naive Reader

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Rus Bowden · at 5:40 PM

pianist and as a young adult she was invited to play for Lawrence Welk. She shared her gift of music by teaching piano and accordion lessons for many years.

She was a very artistic and creative person. Pat enjoyed writing poetry, quilting, basket weaving, cooking, canning, caring for her flower gardens, sewing and homemaking.

from Sheboygan Press: Patricia J. Birenbaum

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Rus Bowden · at 5:38 PM

who died on Saturday aged 82, began his career as a novelist in the 1950s with gritty portrayals of working-class life, but later turned to biography, producing lives of authors ranging from DH Lawrence to Robert Louis Stevenson and of the painters Van Gogh and Cézanne.

from Telegraph: Philip Callow

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Rus Bowden · at 5:14 PM

40, a line producer for the independent Cairo-based Al-Baghdadia, in the head in Baghdad's southwestern neighborhood of Al-Qadissiya at around 4 p.m. on Sunday, a source at the channel told CPJ. The source said that al-Daami was heading home southwest of Baghdad. He added that al-Daami, a well-known poet, had gone to Baghdad to attend a cultural conference on his day off from work.

from Committee to Protect Journalists: Iraqi producer murdered in Baghdad

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Rus Bowden · at 5:12 PM

fishing, camping, drawing, writing poems, and playing the guitar.

from newzjunky.com: Robert F. Hayes

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Rus Bowden · at 5:10 PM

Stella had strong ideas about most everything and shared her advice liberally--most of it with an eye to the safety of her family: Don't eat spinach. Don't eat hamburger. Don't go out wearing your expensive jewelry. Don't take airplanes (she had never flown.)

from The Orange County Register: A woman on the move

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Rus Bowden · at 5:06 PM

marks the end of an era of the finest writing in Urdu. Hyder, also known as Ainee Apa, dominated the world of Urdu literature for over six decades.

from Jahane Rumi: In search of the unsearchable: ". . . O, my soul! where would you find your house?"

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Rus Bowden · at 4:53 PM

Arctic Dreams and Nightmares, [Alootook] Ipellie writes, "Like many of my peers, I would never again pursue my traditional culture and heritage as an Inummarik, a real Inuk. Once embedded in a southern environment, I was trained largely to cope with the white, Angle-Saxon, Euro-Canadian culture."

It was a transition that would shape his work for the rest of his life.

from Northern News Services: Renowned Inuit artist and writer passes away

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Rus Bowden · at 4:52 PM

Jane Austen's novels and Pushkin's poetry, was a "killer chess player," loved classical music and the ballet, played tennis and taught English to Chinese students at Penn's Medical School.

"They were impressed by his Peking duck," Jody said.

He spoke several languages, including Latin.

from Pocono Record: Tobyhanna vet was fearless, peace activist

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Rus Bowden · at 4:50 PM

the public never got to see broadcaster Robin Kora at his best.

The 58-year-old teacher, actor, newsreader and poet died over the weekend.

from Actor, Poet and Newsreader Robin Kora Dies (scroll 1/3 down)

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Rus Bowden · at 4:49 PM

some of [Connor LaFrance's] her son's poems and one read, "I am an original from God," and she said that was the truth.

"We will keep him in our hearts," she said. "We'll cherish him forever."

She said he is up there, riding around at 100 mph.

from The Saratogian: 'He died doing what he loved'

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Rus Bowden · at 4:48 PM

painting pictures, and playing board games and cards.

Miss LaMoreaux was a home economics teacher in Coshocton and in Loudonville in the 1940s.

from The News-Herald: Alice C. LaMoreaux

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Rus Bowden · at 4:46 PM

who was born on September 21, 1924, at Karuvadikuppam in Puducherry. A poet, who took up the cause of the working class and the downtrodden, the bearded 'Tamizh Oli', as he was known, spoke up for the eradication of casteism and poverty.

from The Hindu: Poet Tamizh Oli remembered

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Rus Bowden · at 4:45 PM

of medical experiences in WWII and authored six books of poetry. His poem "The River and the Bridge" commemorates the 1999 dedication of the Neuse River Bridge and is inscribed on a plaque at Union Point Park.

from Sun Journal: Joseph Flanner Patterson Jr., M.D.

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Rus Bowden · at 4:43 PM

working part-time at a Wendy's restaurant, [Steven Adrian] Smith had published a poem and hoped to join the military after graduation.

from Dayton Daily News: Teen dies 6 weeks after being hit by car

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Rus Bowden · at 4:42 PM

of the JMHS literary magazine.

In March, following a motor vehicle accident that claimed the lives of Jackson Memorial students Andrew Miller, 17, and his sister Shatone Glover, 16, Tracy put her literary skills to use and penned the following poem:

from Tri-Town News: Accident claims lives of three young women

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Tuesday, September 25, 2007