Poems: Philip Whalen; Photos: Aram Saroyan

http://www.bigbridge.org/AS-CH.HTM

Beautiful series of photographs taken early in his life by poet Aram Saroyan, and then added to by poet Philip Whalen. A wonderful series full of wit and humanity.

Quote of the Day

The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish spurting out ink.

- George Orwell


Thanks, Del, for this one.

Quote of the Day

Everywhere I go I find that a poet has been there before me.
Sigmund Freud

CORSO - The Last Beat

http://www.corsothefilm.com/index.php

New Writing Courses

Creative Writing Course @ FAWWA

New Creative Writing course starting in Swanbourne at Tom
Collins House 5 March - continuous every Wednesday from 10am to Noon.

10 weeks for $150 or $20 per session.

Tutor: Dr Andrew Burke, author, poet, lecturer.

Venue: Historic TOM COLLINS HOUSE, Wood Street, Swanbourne - in the
bush beside Allen Park, at the base of Melon Hill.

Information and bookings via admin@fawwa.org.au

I'll be starting from scratch.

I will teach techniques which cover -
accessing your own creativity,
prose writing for stories and novels,
and various poetry styles.

And fun and laughter are guaranteed >g<

*

Write Your Life Story
New Writing Workshop
starting Tuesday, March 11, 2008
at Bassendean Library
46 Old Perth Road,
Bassendean 6054

WRITE YOUR LIFE STORY

with your highly experienced
group leader and mentor
ANDREW BURKE

For ten weeks, each Tuesday from
10am to Noon
in the library meeting room,
you can learn techniques how best
to research and write the story
of your life. Sharing with
others in the group makes this
a joyful and life-enriching activity.

Cost? $5 for the complete course.

For enquiries, phone 9279 2966 or
email baslib@bassendean.wa.gov.au



Please pass this on to friends and any groups you think may be interested.

Save the Whales

Save the Whales at www.whalesrevenge.com Sign the petition and play the game (there really is one).

You can't think and play at the same time ...

"JW: When you put your horn in your mouth to play, what's going through your mind?

"SR: When I was a boy practicing the alto sax in my bedroom or in the closet or someplace else in my house, I would sort of do what I do now, which is go into a stream-of-consciousness state. This is what I do today when I’m soloing in a concert setting. I go into this neutral mental state. To create, my mind has to be blank. I may think of a few things at the beginning to get started. But when I really get into a solo, my mind is completely blank. You can’t think and play at the same time. It comes too fast."

Sonny Rollins interviewed on jazzwax, a dedicated blog, but here broadcast at http://fatherbrownatleisure.blogspot.com/2008/02/sonny-rollins-legendary-jazz-soloist.html

Bill Manhire in The Age

Here's a direct quote from Bill Manhire about how a poem starts, a question asked at Lucy Dougan's book launch today of herself and Fay Zwicky:

'The great pleasure, for Manhire, comes from how poetry mines the imagination. "One of the truisms of writing is that you have to show a little respect for your own ignorance rather than start off as a know-all . . . writing what you don't know is at least as important as writing what you know. The whole business of surprise as you write is the great joy."
Often he will just sit down and scribble words for several pages, "until suddenly you just bump into this very strange phrase that you couldn't have anticipated and that is charged with all sorts of resonance, so you chase on after what that phrase suggests and suddenly you are in the territory of what you don't know; that unmapped space".

Or he will start with some sort of trigger, "often just the music of a phrase and I will let that generate what it can - cadence, image, mood, tone or voice - before I find my way to meaning. I want to bump into meaning rather than assert it from the very beginning". '


This and more at http://www.theage.com.au/news/books/the-accidental-poet/2008/02/22/1203467295623.html

A Sorry lot ...

Another grand entertaining satirical moment at http://media.theaustralian.news.com.au/nich/20080222_sorry_lot.htm

Dialogue Sonnet

First, do you mind if I record this as we speak? No,
of course not. Okay then, let’s salivate together.
Reaganite goo has spread itself all over this primary
season, don’t you agree? Well, one might say so,

but it’s early in the century, and the campaign will drag
on for months and months if not years and years. We
will all come to regret our first thoughts, our early
prognostications. Progressive enervation, eh?

Yep, right here in Enervation Nation. Don’t you find
all of this . . . well, shall we say a little Mozartean?
To be sure. But left hands barely hear what the right
hands are doing. Robbing St. Peter to pay St. Paul, eh?

Just so. Thanks for coming in today. One last thought
for our listeners? Just one: Beware the blowflies of fame.




Halvard Johnson

Quote of the Day

"The trouble with words is that you never know whose mouths they've been in."
--Dennis Potter




Thank you, Halvard Johnson, for this delicious quote.

WOW Reading 7.30pm Monday 3 March

Jane Cornes is the coordinator and motivator behind Perth's vibrant city literature readings, Walking On Water - aka WOW. Here is her publicity for next month's event:

Yes, it IS a long weekend and yes, we WILL be having WOW as usual!

Our invited reader is MURRAY JENNINGS, who will read from his just-published book of poetry, "Flash Company".

Given WOW's new format of occasional invited readers and a focus on our own work, please do bring along something/s to share, to a strict maximum of five minutes.

Where: The Laneway, between Murray & Wellington Streets (almost across the road from Miss Maud's)
When: Monday 3 March 2008
Time: 7.30pm
Bring: Your own mug.
Tea and coffee supplied. Biscuits appreciated.
$5 waged/$ unwaged

WOW is a not for profit organisation. We are not funded and all door monies go towards the rent.

Robbe-Grillet RIP

At 85 ...

Creative Writing Course @ FAWWA

New Creative Writing course starting in Swanbourne at Tom
Collins House 5 March - continuous every Wednesday from 10am to Noon.

10 weeks for $150 or $20 per session.

Tutor: Dr Andrew Burke, author, poet, lecturer.

Venue: Historic TOM COLLINS HOUSE, Wood Street, Swanbourne - in the
bush beside Allen Park, at the base of Melon Hill.

Information and bookings via admin@fawwa.org.au

I'll be starting from scratch unless all participants at the first
session are somewhat experienced writers :-)

I will teach techniques which cover -
accessing your own creativity,
prose writing for stories and novels,
and various poetry styles and 'fashionable hijinks'.

And fun and laughter are guaranteed >g<

Lucy Dougan's launch at the Dolphin

The Giramondo Publishing Company
warmly invites you
to the launch of the new
poetry collection by

LUCY DOUGAN

WHITE CLAY

to be launched by
Fay Zwicky

on Saturday 23 February
12.30pm
Perth Writers'Festival
Dolphim Theatre,
University of Western Australia

More information on (08) 6488 5555

Why did the chicken cross the road?

A friend just sent me a very funny 'joke' - replies to the age-old question Why did the chicken cross the road? answered by Dr Phil, George Bush, Oprah, Einstein, etc. My favourite was this:

ERNEST HEMINGWAY : To die in the rain. Alone.


You have to be into Hemingway to appreciate it, but I loved it. The others were mainly obvious - this one was subtle. Well, a little ...

Wednesday & Thursday snap(s)

Every Wednesday
they string-up
lines

all across
suburban skies
four black lines

before the blue
of a startling
clear sky

then birds come -
lorikeets to crows -
to perch and

meditate


*


Thursday evening on dry earth
by the wetlands
bright orange-striped wasp
and greyhaired spider
fight on the run
wasp dragging reverse
spider's legs leaping
dry brown
blades

They move
jerkily over dry grass
like a toddler’s crazy writing
on scrap paper

I stare and can’t tell
who drags who pushes
the thought comes to me
I am standing like
my childhood self
staring at the ground
as the world went by

18 weeks 3D scan -

Meet my next grandkid. Doesn't he look like his father! He or she will be the third child of my eldest son Miles and my daughter-in-law Meredith. Congratulations!

Write Your Life Story

New Writing Workshop
starting Tuesday, March 11, 2008
at Bassendean Library
46 Old Perth Road,
Bassendean 6054

WRITE YOUR LIFE STORY

with your highly experienced
group leader and mentor
ANDREW BURKE

For ten weeks, each Tuesday from
10am to Noon
in the library meeting room,
you can learn techniques how best
to research and write the story
of your life. Sharing with
others in the group makes this
a joyful and life-enriching activity.

Cost? $5 for the complete course.

For enquiries, phone 9279 2966 or
email baslib@bassendean.wa.gov.au



Please pass this on to friends and any groups you think may be interested.

Tuesday Snap

This is definitely a first draft, so feel free to comment. And if the commenting panel bugs you, email me at burkeandre(at)gmail(dot)com


Tuesday morning wind
has blown the birds away
and plants sweep
the garden back
and forth.

He is inside his head
as usual
wind whistling in one ear
the other leeward
and nostalgic for

childhood holiday camps
by the Indian Ocean
dogs’ ears pinned back
all eyes
on the horizon.

He leans
and turns the hose off
hand over hand
he wends it around
the half wheel rim
screwed to the porch.

POETS CORNER THIS SATURDAY @ PAGES CAFE

February 16th 2008
http://www.poetscornerwa.com/PoetsCornerFeb08.html

Vivienne Glance ~ guest-hosting the event with poetic humour, word play and some verbal seduction.

With her invited guests:
Anti-poet allan boyd ~ well known for his dynamic, cutting and cutting-edge spoken word artistry

Nandi Chinna ~ her subtle imagery and sharp observations blend with the gentle sounds of musician Danna Stevenson

Dosh Luckwell ~ State Final runner-up and teller of tales dark and mysterious.

The usual OPEN MIC @ 4pm

Come along and support West Australian poets!

Entry is free but purchase a coffee if you can to support out generous sponsors,
PAGES CAFE and the State Library of WA.

POETS CORNER @ PAGES CAFE
2pm Saturday, 16th February 2008
State Library of WA, Alexander Building ,
Perth Cultural Centre,
(across the bridge from the Wellington Street Train Station)

For more information contact Frances Macaulay Forde: poetscornerwa@yahoo.com.au

Mawson's Hut at Cape Denison, Commonwealth Bay

My cousin Mary Lyden went down south recently, wayyyyy down south, and took some great snaps. Here are a couple of Mawson's hut at Cape Denison - I will try to right that second photo so all his stocks don't fall out into the snow.

A Monday Snap

Monday means nothing
in China where
you work seven days a week.

Monday means nothing
much when
you're unemployed
in Australia.

This Monday I bring
the washing in from
Sunday and wake my wife
late.

Monday's mudlarks play
flying leapfrog over bins
out for collection
on brown summer verges

Hemingway's Honolulu Honeymoon

Ernest Hemingway with Martha Gellhorn on their honeymoon in Honolulu in 1940.

More about Hemingway's play writing and a letter on the subject, plus a great photo of him in the Spanish Civil War, at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/10/theater/10mcgr.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Hangzhou - West Lake in winter

This winter has been most extreme in China, as no doubt you have seen reported in the media. Here's a photo from Reuters of the beautiful West Lake in Hangzhou aboslutely snowed under. We have been told it has frozen over, which would be an amazing sight.

Perth city

After all my talk in recent times of snakes and kangaroos and such, readers outside of Australia may have a rather rural view of what Perth looks like. THis photo was on The West Australian Newspaper's website yesterday, so I've borrowed it to show you this is a thriving metropolis, with its own skyscraper skyline and traffic problems. We are part of the modern Western world, but we are situated on the buttocks of Asia. The NYSX influences our finances on a daily basis, but we trade most fruitfully with China and Japan. The snakes and kangaroos and all our wildlife (koala bears, frill-necked lizards, etc) are mainly way outside the city environs, although we do have wildlife parks for tourists and visitors to see in the outer suburbs.

We have a thriving cultural society, with many writers and artists of renown living and working here, plus musicians from pop to classical. In fact, when it comes to jazz and pop and blues, we excell.

Rain ... at last!

This report from local newspaper, The West Australian:

Record rain brings relief

7th February 2008, 11:45 WST


Perth has recorded its wettest February in 16 years.

The deluge dumped 31.8mm on the city in just six hours causing traffic chaos and bringing relief to gardens and residents across the city.

But the much awaited cooler conditions are not expected to last with a return to stiffling heat expected tomorrow.

The record for February, for 1992, sits at 131mm.

Bureau spokesman John Relf said the difference between the weather out look from yesterday to today was "unbelievable".

“Everything has changed in the past 24 hours,” he said.

“What a difference a day can make, yesterday there was nothing.”

Perth has also exceeded its 35mm summer average to so far record 49.8mm since the beginning of December that included a 48 day run without any rain.

Quote of the Day

Lawrence Clark Powell - "Write to be understood, speak to be heard, read to grow."

'Write to be understood' - someday. So many authors of genius write before their audience catches up with them - Joyce and Beckett in modern (and post-modern) times. Limiting yourself to write for instant understanding can be exactly that: limiting. John Ashbery once said words to the effect that he wrote what he didn't already know - 'Why write what you already know?' was his point of view. Often I write and I didn't know until I read it what I already knew.

Caroline Caddy shortlisted for Adelaide Writers' Festival award

This lifted entire from Fremantle Press blog:

Caroline Caddy's latest collection of poetry, Esperance: new and selected poems, was shortlisted for the prestigious John Bray Poetry Award worth $15,000 this week. The Award will be announced at the Adelaide Writers' Festival on Sunday 2 March.

Caroline Caddy was born in Perth, Western Australia, in 1944 and spent her childhood in the United States and Japan. Since then, she has lived much of her life in Western Australia, raised two children, published seven books of poetry, received national and state fellowships for creative writing, and won the WA Week Literary Award for Poetry and the National Book Council’s Banjo Award in 1992. Her work has been broadcast on ABC Radio National and appeared in numerous literary magazines and anthologies.

Fellow poets up for the John Bray Poetry Prize include Ken Bolton, John Tranter, Claire Gaskin, J. S. Harry and Geoff Page.

Praise for Caroline Caddy
... a master poet with a style and panache all her own - Andrew Burke, West Australian

The poetry is full of words in action and action in words... the sense of an educated sensibility responding to the sensuous universe - Graham Rowlands, Overland

Caddy is at her most stunning when she describes what she's seeing around her - Nikki Gemmell, Quadrant

Haiku for Today

Ron Sims, freelance radio producer, sculptor and friend, dropped by today to record an interview about haiku and to take some haiku away for recording by illustrious acting talent such as my other old buddy Peter Holland. Six degrees? Nah, less'n that in this town. This is all for a future Poetica ABC radio programme - to go to air sometime in the future. I'll no doubt advertise it before hand here on Hispirits.

Anyway, long story short, I had to dig out my haiku from various corners of my poetry files on about three different computers (travel broadens the confusion) and some I found needed attention. Here's one that was a badly written thought until last night. Now, I'm happy with it:

orientation week:
they read each other's
t-shirts

Cottonmouth

Cottonmouth is a performance-based project by and for emerging wordsmiths. Held monthly, Cottonmouth #1 will feature Vivienne Glance, Jay Pruyn, Gabby Everall, Mathas, Benedict Moleta, Kevin Gillam and others. There is a limited open mic spot. Cottonmouth will also feature a national podcast and monthly publication.
Thursday February 7 2008, 7 – 11pm
Bar 459 @ The Rosemount Hotel
$5
For more information visit www.cottonmouth.org.au or make media enquiries by contacting Sean Wilson on 0402 785 592.

Why Does It Still Take So Long To Publish A Book?

Read all about it at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/03/books/review/Donadio-t.html

Maybe you have to sign up - I don't know. I've already signed up some time ago to the New York Times so now it is all easier to access.

PressPress Chapbook Award 2008

Caption: Chris Mansell, publisher, trying to sell a camel driver a chapbook at Sakara

The PressPress Chapbook Award is for an unpublished chapbook length manuscript of poems. The winning manuscript will receive $300 and chapbook publication with PressPress. The Award will be announced in July 2008 on the site.

Conditions of entry

1. The manuscript should be an original poetry of chapbook length (ie 20 to 40 pages). It must be unpublished and not on offer to another publisher in Australia or elsewhere (except that individual poems can be already taken or on offer to journals, sites or anthologies where you keep the copyright).

2. The Award will be made to the best overall chapbook received. PressPress reserves the right not to make an award if the standard of submitted entries is insufficient or to split an Award.

3. The Award will be judged by the PressPress Award panel: the decision will be final and no correspondence will be entered.

4. The Award, $300 (AUD) and publication of the manuscript as a PressPress chapbook, will be announced on the PressPress site in July 2008. The final content of the winning chapbook will be negotiated with PressPress editors.

5. The author's name and address must appear on the entry form but not on the manuscript.

6. A stamped self-addressed envelope (SSAE) big enough to return the manuscript OR a small envelope for notification of results (in this case the original ms will be recycled and the disk destroyed) must be included if you want your entry returned. Entries from outside Australia must be accompanied by an International Reply Paid Postage Coupon.

7. Two copies of the entry should be provided: a hardcopy typed double or one and a half spacing on single-sided A4 with no borders or illustrations or fancy fonts; and, a digital copy on disk as a pdf or in Word (Mac or PC) or Appleworks.

8. Entries must be received by 30 May 2008.

9. Attach an entry form and a cheque or money order (or pay by credit card via PayPal) for the administration fee of $15 (AUD) per entry.

10. Send your entry to: PressPress Chapbook Award 2008 PressPress PO Box 94 Berry NSW 2535 Australia

http://www.presspress.com.au/

Aussie Writers list Expanded

Thanks, Helen Hagemann, for prompting me to add a few more to this list, and I added one or two more ...

50 Best Australian Writers since 1945 ...
(in no particular order)

Helen Garner,
Peter Carey,
Tim Winton,
Patrick White,
Gwen Harwood,
Vincent Buckley,
David Williamson,
AD Hope,
David Malouf,
John Tranter,
Les Murray,
Robert Adamson,
Kevin Hart,
Peter Cowan,
Shirley Hazzard,
Janette Turner-Hospital,
Frank Moorhouse,
Hal Porter,
Randolph Stowe,
Andrew Taylor,
Dorothy Hewett,
Thom Shapcott,
John Forbes,
Judith Wright,
Thomas Kenneally,
Glenda Adams,
Elizabeth Jolley,
Kim Scott,
Kenneth Slessor,
Thea Astley,
Bruce Dawe,
Morris Gleitzman,
John Marsden,
Clive James,
Kate Grenville,
Ern Malley,
Bruce Beaver,
Peter Porter,
John Kinsella,
Geoff Page,
Jack Davis,
John Blight,
Geraldine Brooks,
Paul Jennings,
Brenda Walker,
Gail Jones,
Dorothy Porter ...

Introducing Mez Breeze ...

Gabe Gudding pointed me toward Mez Breeze as another great Aussie writer since 1945. Well, multimedia etc is an area I didn't have represented, so I invite you to go to http://www.hotkey.net.au/~netwurker/free.htm and check it out for yourselves.

Hie thee hither and enjoy ...

Issue eight of Otoliths http://the-otolith.blogspot.com/ ,
the southern summer 2008 issue, has just gone live.

It's a few days early, but it's straining at the leash & seams so it seemed a good idea to let it loose before it ate the house up.

The issue contains, in order of appearance, work by Michele Leggott, Geof Huth, Nicholas Manning, Laurie Price, Sandy McIntosh, Reed Altemus, Alicia Dangereyes, Bill Drennan, gustave morin, Paul Hardacre, Felino Soriano, Pradip Datta, Spencer Selby, Spencer Selby & Jukka-Pekka Kervinen, David-Baptiste Chirot, Kristine Ong Muslim, Joshua A Ware, Patrick Gulke, James Sanders, Jill Chan, J. D. Nelson, Eric Burke, Philip Byron Oakes, Louie Crew, Márton Koppány, Thomas Fink & Maya Fink, Richard Kostelanetz, Paul Siegell, Gregory Vincent St. Thomasino, Sheila E. Murphy & John M.Bennett, Luigino Solamito & John M. Bennett, John M. Bennett, Jeff Harrison,John Lowther, Alexander Jorgensen, Martin Edmond, Christopher Major, Elisa Gabbert & Kathleen Rooney, Caleb Puckett, Cecelia Chapman, Guy Beining, Vernon Frazer, Bobbi Lurie, harry k stammer, Andrew Topel, Thomas Fink & Andrew Riley Clark.

As usual, it's a marvellous mix of all sorts of things. Hie thee hither & enjoy.

Mark Young

frontispiece by Andrew Topel, Jim Leftwich & John M. Bennett

Recognition in the Australia Day Honours list

Fuck poets. They're the most self-centred, selfish arseholes on the
planet!!! Rupert Mallin

Lovely.

voicebox reading in February

Aminah, singer songwriter and poet
& Annamaria Weldon, FAWWA Masterclass poet
plus open mic

"La Tropicana Cafe"
177 High street Fremantle.

Thursday Feb 7th at 7.30 pm.
cost: $5.00/$3.00conc

voiceboxfreo@yahoo.com.au

Wonderful Town by Frederick Pollack

1

It’s 6:30, which means things
are getting serious. Not necessarily
a crisis – only a report, prospectus,
due diligence. And that sense,
however familiar and subdued,
of rededication: quick wash, second shave,
swipe of hand sanitizer. The slacks that appear,
turning into the aisle
between the cubicles the next room over,
are a woman’s. Is she loyal, will she stay?
… no, she’s gone,
down to a block of freezing rain
before her cab or subway. Four
in the window office
remain. A neocon
I knew once became almost tearful,
praising the connotations of the word
company. The eldest
(I think) has slung his jacket
over a chair. The possible
young hope, young blood, or someone’s
idiot nephew gestures –
a repeated downward pump or jab.
Striped shirt never moves. Green tie
shifts once, is still.
No laptops, stenograph, speakerphone, realtime
output, which means this
is serious? or that drinks
and dinner are delayed somewhere
for ideas? Their wall is bare
and white. In these blocks, no
“green” enterprises, NGOs, pro bono; so
one knows, more or less, who they are … Now the Old Man
looks out and down
at the rain puddling the twentieth-floor setback,
then at my hotel, at me,
whom at this distance (mystery is distance)
he can’t see.

2

The espresso machine like a Victorian monument
bronzed, the tables like Braque’s guéridons,
the display case for cannoli,
the notional chairs and between-table spaces,
the walls brown from the smoking ages,
the waiters’ trance, and this stretch of MacDougal
don’t change with the decades. But today
the place seems given to a private party,
quiet and unannounced. The kid
with his absurd beret and the one-volume
Schopenhauer he doesn’t so much read
as carry, the more or less fat
guys with their Marx and journals,
and a few older men
seem at least in one sense together –
they have eyes only for each other
(and for the long-haired girl in a pleated skirt
who doesn’t appear). Though no two glances meet.
One probes a pocket for the number
at which he must call his father
from a payphone; another for his cellphone, to call
his wife. The kid perhaps ponders;
the thirty-something and forty-something read;
another stops because the light’s too dim.
They take out notebooks and write,
or try to. Is that how they communicate?
They’d deny it …
(Outside, some sort of demonstration passes
without a break, and fades;
no one comes in. There’s no one to talk to, ever.)
If they did write each other,
what would they say? “You can’t write anything here.
If you do, you’ll reject it later
as sentimental.” Seeing which, the boy rises,
surreptitiously tucks in his too-tight
turtleneck, fills his bookbag,
and leaves, expression resolute and dreamy
because that’s expected of him.

3

Actually, we don’t discuss
the obvious: arthritis drawing
cries from him whenever he canes
himself up, and slightly hobbling
my own step when I cross the room
to fetch some book he has pointed to.
Or loneliness, or politics – the bullies
that roam the body and the world will have
their way, and meanwhile jabber;
we ignore them, though they strain and shape
all speech. He has grown very white
since our last meeting, fifteen years
and hundreds of emails ago, I very gray.
The relics of his lover, who had disliked me
on sight, lie small and quaint
amid the clutter, and a ghost informs
the collages – ties, real ties imposed on penciled –
he’s doing. He gives me one.
Reads new poems, vers-de-société
of hell and the low slopes of purgatory.
Paws what I bought
at the Strand: Stead’s work since his stroke, Matthias
sounding old, old. “Always the tourist,” he smiles.
“You’re scoping out the terminal wards.”
– “I want to see how much they transcend
the personal, and if not, why they can’t.” –
“Perhaps because there’s nothing else,” he says,
provoking. – And one or two
young free-associaters, who have no story
but the stupid one the world imposes,
“but at least aren’t chuckleheads”:
thus I defend them, and bore him.
He rarely leaves the apartment;
is interested when I describe
the cardboard, low-grade porn and verathaned
ads at the New Museum
on the rapidly gentrifying Bowery. “’Unmonumental’ –
that’s what they call the show. The wall-text
talks about art ‘responsive to an age
of broken icons.’ It struck me
there’s a contradiction in that.”
– “The longer I live, or last,” he says,
“the more I address one question
to whatever I see and read:
would anything be lost if this didn’t exist?
If the answer is no, burn it.”
We have been drinking all this time:
one glass each, slowly. Now he offers
another, but I have to go.
Once more I praise his recent work.
“I was glad to meet you again,” he says.
“You seem to be more yourself than I remember.”
I tell him teaching helped. And poetry.
“Not an afterthought,” he smiles. Stands, painfully;
we embrace as if we’ll meet again.
Afternoon sun
pours down the airshaft to his window.

4

They queue, for rock clubs, movies,
all-you-can-eat restaurants, even
the tchotchke shops, to buy Liberty
in snow-globes, foam, or pre-aged bronze.
The lines intersect the crowds,
so dense and slowed they feel
as in dreams that the illusion of movement
will fail any moment.
Their coats absorb the smudged and trodden
colors, poor relations of those above.
To the east, the shows are letting out –
the fishnet dancers in Cook County jail,
a lion cub becoming king,
a sexless lover with a mask – their music,
in the minds of the new crowds exiting,
merging at the corner with the noise.
The new Stoppard may or may not
have taught that rock-and-roll is freedom;
that one can relax into freedom
if one abandons murderous ideals.
A couple next to us, with strict ideas
of entertainment, squirmed at allusions
to unfamiliar dates and names,
to history, and left at intermission.
There are cabs, but they rage,
like other cars, for movement;
we’ll take the E or 6 or walk
crosstown to our hotel –
the cold rejuvenating us,
sustaining another hour
the feeling that friends, drinks, dinner,
window-shopping, the theater can go on.
Call it joy, whose center is above
this corner, all its plasma screens
broadcasting fragments of it: cars, breasts,
the sea, disembodied dancing
handbags, market shares, wise commentators,
an ecstatic Riemannian geometry
of colors, colors, colors one yearns
to rise and merge and splinter into,
all motion effortless and theirs, reflected
in the faces now surrounding us, blasé
or brooding, avid for the possible.


Frederick Pollack was born in Chicago. He is the author of two book-length narrative poems, The Adventure and Happiness, both published by Story Line Press. Other poems and essays have appeared in Fulcrum, Hudson Review, Representations, Poetry Salzburg Review, Die Gazette (Munich), Gladhat, Malleable Jangle, Famous Reporter and elsewhere. He is adjunct professor of creative writing at George Washington University, Washington, DC.

Heath Ledger RIP

There will be a million questions, there will be a million theories, there will be a million baseless accusations, but he will remain dead, a victim of the celebrity machine.

I'm Not There poster

I took this great retro style poster from Pam Brown's blog at http://thedeletions.blogspot.com/

Brilliant movie. Go see it if you haven't.

Photos from Launch of Tracy Ryan's book Saturday

Tracy Ryan signing her book, and Andrew Taylor, (standing)who launched the book, talking to Glen Phillips, (sitting)who supplied the photos.

50 Best British Writers since 1945 - and 50 Best Australian Writers since 1945

Hey, I am amazed at the rankings of this list! Maybe it is not meant to be in order, but they have numbered them - with Philip Larkin at Number One! And Ted Hughes at ... We'll all have a different scale, won't we. Take a look - anyone missing?

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/article3127837.ece

Now, how about an Aussie list?

50 Best Australian Writers since 1945 ...
(in no particular order)

Helen Garner,
Peter Carey,
Tim Winton,
Patrick White,
Gwen Harwood,
Vincent Buckley,
David Williamson,
AD Hope,
David Malouf,
John Tranter,
Les Murray,
Robert Adamson,
Kevin Hart,
Peter Cowan,
Shirley Hazzard,
Janette Turner-Hospital,
Frank Moorhouse,
Hal Porter,
Randolph Stowe,
Andrew Taylor,
Dorothy Hewett,
Thom Shapcott,
John Forbes,
Judith Wright,
Thomas Kenneally,
Glenda Adams,
Elizabeth Jolley,
Kim Scott,
Kenneth Slessor,
Thea Astley,
Bruce Dawe,
Morris Gleitzman,
John Marsden,
Clive James,
Kate Grenville,
Ern Malley,
Bruce Beaver,
Peter Porter,
John Kinsella,
Geoff Page,
Jack Davis,
John Blight,
Geraldine Brooks,
Paul Jennings,
Brenda Walker,
Gail Jones,
Dorothy Porter ...


Ah, I don't know how many there now. Feel free to add, subtract, and disagree. Thanks to my wife Jeanette for contributing to this list as well.

'Books of 2007' from http://poetry.about.com/

Top Picks - Poetry Picks: The Best Books of 2007 from your Poetry Guide

Selected by Poetry Guide Bob Holman.... This was Alice Notley's Year -- we just called it 2007, but two of her books entered the world this year. And two big books on two big but generally overlooked Heroes of the Beats, Helen Adam and Philip Whalen, made a deliciously illogical sense in this, the Year of the Continuing Break-down of US Democracy.

1) Grave of Light: New & Selected Poems 1970-2005, by Alice Notley
(Wesleyan University Press, 2006) Not only did two of Alice Notley's books come into the world this year -- it's also the year that the Academy of American Poetry saw fit to award the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize to an expat poet in Paris who figured out how to do it (write the poems to change gravity) as an "experimental third generation New York School poet." No doubt Grave of Light is the best intro to the incredible range of Notley, from the breezy, Berriganish early work to the genuinely bizarre form and astonishing political/folk epic content of The Descent of Alette to the dense mysterious prose-po combo found in the recent Disobedience and Alma. It's like sailing a mirror, a gloss on the moss.

2) In the Pines, by Alice Notley
(Penguin Group USA, 2007) Grave of Light is the best place for readers new to Notley to begin... But for me, it's the amazing trip of In the Pines that squeals the wheel. Notley has never steered away from the hard parts, but never before has she dared the Reader to join her in seeing just how much pain one can endure, how much beauty one can stand. There is no one else in literature whose voice moves so deeply inside you, and moves things so deeply inside you, as you read. Book of the Year, poet of the age, Alice Notley.

3) A Helen Adam Reader, edited by Kristin Prevallet
(National Poetry Foundation, 2007) Adam (1910 - 1993), a tiny Scottish figure, the Den Mother of the Beats, wrote primarily in a jangly, Scots ballad style, often contemporized: "Goodbye transcendent Tompkins Square / I haven't long to stay. / A double jolt of heroin and I'll be on my way..." And always with a veneer of myth, generally Egyptian. But Prevallet is not content with these generalities, and uncovers in Adam not only the odd woman out of the Beat movement, but an extraordinary outsider artist, a cohort of Duncan's, a precursor of performance poetry, a genuine eccentric, and a poet to be reckoned with. This book is an incredible achievement.

Posthumous NBCC Award Nomination for Politkovskaya

from Lizok's Bookshelf at http://lizoksbooks.blogspot.com/2008/01/posthumous-nbcc-award-nomination-for.html

I was surprised – very pleasantly! – to learn that the National Book Critics Circle nominated A Russian Diary,(http://russianwriting.com/_wsn/page5.html ) written by journalist Anna Politkovskaya and translated by Arch Tait, for its autobiography award.

Tait’s Web site contains pages about Politkovskaya books that he translated: Russian Diary and Putin’s Russia. The Putin’s Russia page includes links to tributes to Politkovskaya, who was murdered on October 7, 2006, in her Moscow apartment building.

Ralph Wessman at Famous Reporter talks with Jane Williams

Quote:
"For me honouring writing and the compulsion to do it means believing in writing as valuable and valued work - to believe what I do is of use ... And often this is a tall order. Writing, we know, is a solitary process, there are often conflicting loyalties at play and 'art as work' isn’t a comfortable concept in a producer/consumer driven society. It’s not as easy to acknowledge the process of writing as work the way it is say the process of building of a house. You can watch somebody at work building their house day in day out and appreciate the process on the same level you might appreciate the finished house. Watching somebody writing or
rather in the process of writing would inevitably entail periods of witnessing the writer ‘away with the faeries’ staring at the blank
sheet/screen/wall or apparently nothing at all! "

Read more at ...

http://walleahpress.com.au/FR36Williams.html

Jane Williams' website is at http://janewilliams.wordpress.com/

Ahadada Books presents HANK LAZER'S FIRST PORTIONS Chapbook

http://www.ahadadabooks.com/content/blogcategory/17/43/

Not only an interesting title itself, but a very interesting stable of writers and (e)book productions. Take a look ...

You have to laugh ...

Peter Nicholson at The Australian has just put together a short compile of the best snippets from Kevin07 for last year. Follow this link:

http://media.theaustralian.news.com.au/nich/20080109_kevin07_choice_cuts.htm

A great many laughs for free!

'Scar Revision' by Tracy Ryan launch

TRACY RYAN invites you to the launch of her new book of
poems, Scar Revision (Fremantle Press)

on Saturday 19 January
at 2pm
in Pages Cafe at the Alexander Library
Perth Cultural Centre

Further details at the Poets' Corner website

http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-QEozNQwhdKMbrY6g8WhusPkJD6gU

I'm Not There

Today my wife and I went to the 10.30am session of I'm Not There at the Luna cinema in Leederville. Yep, 10.30am. Back when I was first hearing Bob Dylan I probably wouldn't have been up at that hour, but that's beyond the point.

This is one great film. Okay, I'm a Dylan fan and blind to a lot of his blemishes: maybe I would like it whatever it was. But I am also a fussy film goer and to get me to like a mainstream USAmerican movie is difficult. This film is brilliant. It is creative, it makes exceptional use of its medium, it surprises at every turn, even when you know most of the story before the film begins, and the acting is part of the high quality of the film. Cate Blanchett is a knock-out. You start out thinking, There's Cate as Bob, but quickly you think, you KNOW, that it is Bob Dylan. Amazing. I even had the presence of mind late in the film to pause in my belief and try to see Cate Blanchett in Dylan - but by then she was Dylan. Eerie. (What would he feel when he saw her as himself?)

I knew there were six actors playing different parts of Dylan before I arrived at the cinema and bought my choc-bomb. I knew it and thought these aspects of his character would be portrayed in chronological sequence. Wrong: they are shuffled skillfully and rhythmically, so that previous aspects of the film build on adjacent scenes by association(s). The wonderful example of an older Dylan character getting back in touch with his earlier more creative self through literally jumping back on the train worked extremely well, and I don't think it would have made such a connection if the young negro Woody Guthrie character had been way up the beginning of the film only.

The way the music is used is interesting, too. Sometimes, Dylan sings and the actor mimes; sometimes the actor sings, including the very young negro boy; other times the music is mixed into the background and builds up until the vocal buds forth; and, a couple of times, other pop music of the period is played as relevant TV news footage or some such is shown. I haven't investigated the soundtrack yet, so I'll tell you later what's on that.

There is one thing that seriously bothers me: if you didn't know enough about Dylan before you saw the movie, you'd be lost. Confused. You would be rattled by tarantulas walking across the screen and a motorbike crossing the screen and crashing, and the album covers and other recognisable photography aspects/visual data wouldn't carry the weight they do with recognition by the viewer.

Okay, I'm a one-eyed Dylan fan - but this also means I would be sorely disappointed if this biopic had been less than it is. This film is as creative, as surprising and entertaining, as an extended Dylan song - say, like Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands. Which reminds me - there are no obvious 'hits' in this movie. One song used I know was released as a single and never on a single album (maybe on compilations). Another was a re-orchestration of a Basement Tapes track. Interesting choices - needless to say, I loved 'em all (not so much the Christian track, but that's my bias showing through.)

If you have the chance, go and see I'm Not There. You won't be disappointed.

Don't follow the signs

from -
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/visualart/story/0,,2233577,00.html

Art? Life? Perplexed which road to take? Then, take both!

Possibilities ...

I'm not an expert on Copyright, so I will only post a taste of this poem by Robert Creeley, posted ('by permission') on the Poetry Daily website -

Possibilities

For Susan Rothenberg

What do you wear?
How does it feel
to wear clothes?
What shows
what you were or where?

This accident, accidental, person,
feeling out, feelings out—
outside the box one's in—
skin's resonances, reticent romances,
the blotch of recognition, blush?

It's a place one's going,
going out to, could reach
out just so far to be at the edge
of it all, there, no longer inside,
waiting, expectant, a confused thing.

Ah, it's a delightful poem to read and I urge you to find it and read it at http://www.poems.com/. (Go to the archives and input Creeley.)

Here is the final verse:

Nothing's apart from all and seeing is
the obvious beginning of an act
can only bring one closer to the art
of being closer. So feeling all there is,
one's hands and heart grow full.


Robert Creeley
The Collected Poems of Robert Creeley, 1975-2005
University of California Press

Gibb River Station

Multilingual birds sing
over dry leaf maracas
on a sunburnt land. See them
bad-bugger Brahmin bulls at it –
dry creek, no tucker.
Red cloud rises
but no stockmen see. They’re
in Derby on the piss. Home alone,
law lady Maudie lies in bed, Gnarnygin
stories in her head: After the mob left
Wandjina came and turned that snake
into stone. I leave my desk
to walk and think.

The Kimberley text
is in shadow play, today:
outcrop and gorge, red dirt polyglossia
of crow claw, roo paw and grader wheels.
Signs and the dignified signified
clear in my head to sing
the thisness of all things

'Beckett Shorts' in New York with Baryshnikov

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/27/arts/dance/27maca.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

Photo above: Mikhail Baryshnikov in “Act Without Words II,” one of four short plays in “Beckett Shorts,” at New York Theater Workshop.

Poet of the Year: John Ashbery

At this time of year, the media seems to delight in appointing the Best of the Year in almost everything. Not to be outdone, poet Edward Byrne has declared John Ashbery 'Poet of the Year', a choice that is not surprising. As a poet, Ashbery perplexes many but at the same time mesmerises more.

Take a look at the full article at http://edwardbyrne.blogspot.com/2007/12/poet-of-year-john-ashbery.html

That article, or posting, mentions a Marjorie Perloff review of Ashbery's latest Selected which makes great reading at http://www.bookforum.com/inprint/014_04/1378

Submission call

Poetry Sz:demystifying mental illness
http://poetrysz.blogspot.com is
calling for submissions for its 25th issue.

Send 4-6 poems and a short bio in the body of your
email to poetrysz@yahoo.com


Please read the submission guidelines first before
submitting.

Thanks.

J Chan
editor

John Lennon says ...

"Reality leaves a lot to the imagination."

Oscar Peterson RIP

Oscar Emmanuel Peterson
August 25 1925 - December 23 2007

Oscar's wife and daughter have posted a message at http://oscarpeterson.com

'In 2004 The Late Niels Henning Orsted Pedersen suggested that Oscar write lyrics to "When Summer Comes". In 2005 when Niels passed away, Oscar persued this and asked Elvis Costello to write lyrics. On Oscar's 80th Birthday event, Diana Krall sang the lyrics that Elvis wrote. Oscar loved the lyrics, and we thought it would be fitting to have them here for others to enjoy.'


When Summer Comes
Music by Oscar Peterson
Lyrics by Elvis Costello
Originally Performed by Diana Krall


The land was white
While the winter moon as absent from the night
And the blackness only pierced by far off stars
But as every day still succeeds the darkest moments we have known
When season turn
Springtime colours will return
And as the first pale flowers of the lengthening hours
Seem to brighten the twilight and that melancholy cloak
Then a fresh perfume just seems to burst from each bloom
Until the green shoots through each day
As it arrives in every shade of hope
When Summer Comes
There will be a dream of peace
And a breath that I've held so long that I can barely release
Then perhaps I may even find a room somewhere
Just a place I can still speak to you

Ho-ho-hum ...

Merry Christmas to you all ...

This is a very hot Christmas period down here - 38 Celsius for Christmas Day and a threatened 40 degrees for Boxing Day. As my wife, today's Mrs Malaprop, said recently, trying to be jolly, Ho-hum ... Christmas.

I found the imaginative Christmas tree photographed above at the Guildford Markets a week ago, just after we arrived back in Perth. It is constructed out of corrugated iron, a reminder of our many hours on 'corrugation road', the Gibb River Road of The Kimberley.

Creeley Lives!

In this fast growing but ultimately isolated city, Perth, poetry CDs are a rare item in mainstream shops. In this city's suburb of Mt Lawley there is a very popular video store Planet Video which has expanded vigorously in past years and now sports CD sales, DVD sales, and Planet Books, which has perhaps the best poetry selection of any bookstore in Perth.

Long story short, I was in there yesterday, doing some last minute Christmas shopping, when I stumbled across the above CD - Robert Creeley with Steve Swallow. Of course, there isn't enough Creeley for my taste, but he was a minimalist poet, so I suppose a minimal amount of poetry spoken in Creeley's unique style would represent his work well.

I once had the honour of spending time with Creeley here in Perth, and heard him read. He was a generous man with his time and with his information, so this CD brings back great memories for me, besides being a great enforcer of the tone of his poems in The Collected Poems of RC which I have from the University of California Press, 1982.

Here is a short quote from the end of a review in All About Jazz http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/article.php?id=23904 which expresses my basic reaction to this CD:

Poets look askance (as did Shelley all that time ago in “Ozymandias”) at claims regarding the permanence of human creation. Perhaps; but on this record, Robert Creeley is still speaking, and thanks to Swallow’s musical contribution, we can hear him a little better than we otherwise might.



Tracks: Oh No; Names; Here Again; Ambition; Indians; From Histoire De Florida; Sufi Sam Christian; Later; From Wellington, New Zealand / From Eight Plus; Miles; Just In Time; Return; Echo; Sad Advice; Riddle; Blue Moon; I Know A Man; A Valentine For Pen.


Personnel: Steve Swallow: bass; Robert Creeley: voice; Steve Kuhn: piano; The Cikada String Quartet: Henrik Hannisdal: violin; Odd Hannisdal: violin; Marek Konstantynowicz: viola; Morten Hannisdal: cello.

from CompleteClassics.com, a poem by Vasko Popa

In The Village Of My Ancestors


Someone embraces me
Someone looks at me with the eyes of a wolf
Someone takes off his hat
So I can see him better

Everyone asks me
Do you know how I'm related to you

Unknown old men and women
Appropriate the names
Of young men and women from my memory

I ask one of them
Tell me for God's sake
Is George the Wolf still living

That's me he answers
With a voice from the next world

I touch his cheek with my hand
And beg him with my eyes
To tell me if I'm living too

Vasko Popa

Joke of the Day

Alhambra Poetry Calendar 2008

"The works in the Poetry Calendar – as diverse and distinctive a gathering of voices as can be imagined – offer a way to begin each day newly awakened, newly convinced that words are not the end of thought, they are where it begins." —Jane Hirshfield

A surprise-desk calendar and a poetry anthology in one, the beautifully designed and presented Alhambra Poetry Calendar 2008 contains 366 poems by 340 poets. Meant for your desktop or bedside table, the calendar showcases work by some of the best American, British, Canadian, Australian, and Irish poets from the 14th to the 21st century. Poetry calendars are also available in French, German, Italian, and Spanish.

Did I say I loved this idea before? Ah, the list of poets contributing includes lots of Australians. Great idea. Perhaps an Aussie publisher should do an Australian desktop calendar for 2009. I'll be the editor ...

For more details, http://www.alhambrapublishing.com/

PETER ABBS MARY ADAMS DAN ALBERGOTTI PAMELA ALEXANDER DICK ALLEN L. N. ALLEN MONIZA ALVI DONALD ANDERSON NIN ANDREWSANONYMOUS TALVIKKI ANSEL ALAN ANSEN DAVID BAKER CHRISTIANNE BALK MARY JO BANG ELLEN BASS DEREK BEAULIEU JEANNE MARIE BEAUMONT JACK B. BEDELL MARVIN BELL CHARLES BERNSTEIN JILL BIALOSKY LINDA BIERDS DAVID BIESPIEL WILLIAM BLAKE ROBERT BLY MICHELLE BOISSEAU CHRISTIAN BÖK EAVAN BOLAND STEPHANIE BOLSTER BRUCE BOND MARIANNE BORUCH GEORGE BOWERING CATHY SMITH BOWERS GEORGE BRADLEY DIONNE BRAND SUSAN BRIANTE GEOFFREY BROCK PATRICIA BRODY CATHARINE SAVAGE BROSMAN JOEL BROUWER DEBORAH BROWN ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING ROBERT BROWNING ANDREA HOLLANDER BUDY KATHRYN STRIPLING BYER GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON PETER CAMPION NICK CARBO LEWIS CARROLL CATHERINE CARTER JOHN CLARE GEORGE ELLIOTT CLARKE SUZANNE CLEARY ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH BILLY COLLINS MARTHA COLLINS DAVID CONSTANTINE PETER COOLEY ROBERT CORDING PETER COVINO ABRAHAM COWLEY CHRIS WALLACE CRABBE KEVIN CRAFT STEVEN CRAMER HART CRANE ROBERT CRAWFORD ALISON CROGGON LORNA CROZIER DEBORAH CUMMINS JAMES CUMMINSAVERILL CURDY CHARLES D’ORLÉANS MARY DALTON CORTNEY DAVIS GREG DELANTY EMILY DICKINSON MAGGIE DIETZ FRED DINGS GREGORY DJANIKIAN BERNARD DONOGHUE JANE DRAYCOTT MICHAEL DRAYTON JOSEPH DUEMER SASHA DUGDALE DENISE DUHAMEL ANTONY DUNN STUART DYBEK CORNELIUS EADY THOMAS SAYERS ELLIS CLAUDIA EMERSONLANDIS EVERSON HELEN FARISH JULIE FAYBETH ANN FENNELLY EDWARD FIELD LEONTIA FLYNN CARLOYN FORCHÉ CHRIS FORHAN ALICE FRIMAN CAROL FROST JOHN FULLER ALICE FULTON ERICA FUNKHOUSER BRENDAN GALVIN CHRISTINE GARREN DOREEN GILDROY MARIA MAZZIOTTI GILLAN DANA GIOIA RAY GONZALEZ CHARMAINE GREEN JIM GREENHALF LINDA GREGERSON EAMON GRENNAN WILLIAM HABINGTON MARILYN HACKER RACHEL HADAS MARIAN HADDAD DANIEL HALL BARBARA HAMBY SAM HAMILL SOPHIE HANNAH THOMAS HARDY JAMES HARMS MICHAEL S. HARPER JEFFREY HARRISON LOLA HASKINS DOLORES HAYDEN JENNIFER MICHAEL HECHT MICHAEL HEFFERNAN JOHN HENNESSY DAVID HERNANDEZ ROBERT HERRICK BOB HICOK TOBIAS HILL BRENDA HILLMANEDWARD HIRSCH JANE HIRSHFIELD H. L. HIX TONY HOAGLAND JOHN HOLLANDER STEPHEN HOLT THOMAS HOOD GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS JOHN HOPPENTHALER A. E. HOUSMANCHRISTOPHER HOWELL ANDREW HUDGINS MAJOR JACKSON MARK JARMAN PETER JOHNSON LIBBY FALK JONES BEN JONSON ALLISON JOSEPHMARILYN KALLET PAUL KANE MARTHA KAPOS KATIA KAPOVICH JOHN KEATS BRIGIT PAGEEN KELLY ROBERT KELLY X. J. KENNEDY JESSE LEE KERCHEVAL MIMI KHALVATIWAQAS KHWAJA JOHN KINSELLA SUSAN KINSOLVING RUDYARD KIPLING DAVID KIRBYKARL KIRCHWEY AUGUST KLEINZAHLER JOHN KOETHE SONNET L’ABBÉ DEBORAH LANDAU PATRICK LANE DORIANNE LAUX D. H. LAWRENCEBRONWYN LEA DAVID LEHMAN PHILLIS LEVIN PHILIP LEVINE TIM LIARDET WILLIAM LOGAN HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW SUSAN LUDVIGSON THOMAS LUX KATHLEEN LYNCH JOANIE MACKOWSKI SARAH MANGUSO RANDALL MANN KATHRYN MARIS DAVID MASON HAROLD MASSINGHAM BEN MAZER GAIL MAZUR J. D. McCLATCHY GARDNER McFALL DEBORAH McGILL JAMIE McKENDRICK BOB McKENTY ANDREW McNEILLIE JOSHUA MEHIGAN HERMAN MELVILLEROBERT MINHINNICK LADY MARY WORTLEY MONTAGU ESTHER MORGAN ANDREW MOTION ERIN MOURÉ SIMONE MUENCH PAUL MULDOON GEORGE MURRAY LES MURRAY CAROL MUSKE-DUKES DALJIT NAGRA RICHARD NEWMAN AIMEE NEZHUKUMATATHIL PHILIP NIKOLAYEV EDWARD NOBLES JEAN NORDHAUS KATE NORTHROP D. NURKSE NAOMI SHIHAB NYE GEOFFREY O’BRIEN KEVIN O’CONNOR STEVE ORLEN GREGORY S. ORR JACQUELINE OSHEROW ALICIA OSTRIKER GEOFF PAGE ERIC PANKEY JAY PARINI ALAN MICHAEL PARKER ELISE PARTRIDGE EMANUEL DI PASQUALE LINDA PASTAN COVENTRY PATMORE OLIVER DE LA PAZ MOLLY PEACOCK PASCALE PETIT CARL PHILLIPS ROBERT PINSKY DONALD PLATT STANLEY PLUMLY JACOB POLLEY JACQUELYN POPE CHRISTINA PUGH SARA QUEYRAS LAWRENCE RAAB SIR WALTER RALEGH JOHN REDMOND DERYN REES-JONES FRANKLIN REEVE PAISLEY REKDAL BETSY RETALLACK JAMES RICHARDSON ATSURO RILEY MAURICE RIORDAN DAVID RIVARD ROBIN ROBERTSON DAVID RODERICK PATRICK ROSAL LAURIE ROSENBLATT J. ALLYN ROSSER CHRISTINA ROSSETTI GIG RYAN KAY RYAN MICHAEL RYAN C. J. SAGE MICHAEL SALCMAN MARY JO SALTER EVA SALZMAN FIONA SAMPSON MARK SCHORR PENELOPE SCHOTT GRACE SCHULMAN LLOYD SCHWARTZ WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE RAVI SHANKAR DON SHARE PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY REGINALD SHEPHERD ANDREW SHIELDS VIVIAN SHIPLEY SIR PHILIP SIDNEY JEFFREY SKINNER FLOYD SKLOOT ALEX SKOVRON JOHN SKOYLES TOM SLEIGH BRUCE SMITH R. T. SMITH THOMAS R. SMITH W. D. SNODGRASS DAVID SOLWAY ELIZABETH SPIRES JEAN SPRACKLAND A. E. STALLINGS SUSAN STEWART DABNEY STUART VIRGIL SUAREZ GLADYS SWAN MATTHEW SWEENEY JONATHAN SWIFT GEORGE SZIRTES JAMES TATE ANDREW TAYLOR MARILYN TAYLOR ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON EDWARD THOMAS ADAM THORPE DANIEL TOBIN JOHN TRANTER NATASHA TRETHEWEY BRIAN TURNER CHASE TWICHELL SIDNEY WADE DAVID WAGONER SUE WALKER ROSANNA WARREN MICHAEL WATERS ELLEN DORÉ WATSON INGRID WENDT CARLOYN BEARD WHITLOW WALT WHITMAN SUSAN WICKS DARA WIER RICHARD WILBUR C. K. WILLIAMS JOHN WILMOT, EARL OF ROCHESTER ELEANOR WILNER CHRISTIAN WIMAN TERENCE WINCH ANNE WINTERS TERRI WITEK WILLIAM WORDSWORTH CECILIA WOLOCH BARON WORMSER C. D. WRIGHT CHARLES WRIGHT FRANZ WRIGHT ROBERT WRIGLEY LADY MARY WROTH STEPHEN YENSER CHRYSS YOST C. DALE YOUNG DEAN YOUNG GARY YOUNG OUYANG YU

Brilliant Gallery

http://www.nytimes.com/library/photos/leibovitz/graham.html

Save the Whales

www.whalesrevenge.com is trying to get a million people to sign a petition to stop whaling.

Tell as many people as you can about the website, that
would be a great help.

Remember to sign the petition.

'Beowulf' the Movie

If you know the story of the book, if you like the sound of the original, if you value the tradition and history of this ancient of all English epic poems, then skip the latest film version. Maybe it is okay as a flick for action fans, but it is not okay as a true representation of the Beowulf tale.

Here's a bit of what the New York Times revieiwer had to say about it:

You don’t need to wait for Angelina Jolie to rise from the vaporous depths naked and dripping liquid gold to know that this “Beowulf” isn’t your high school teacher’s Old English epic poem. Ms. Jolie plays the bad girl in “Beowulf,” a wicked demon, the mother of all monsters — here, Grendel, played by Crispin Glover — who can switch from hag to fab in the wink of a serpentine eye. If you don’t remember this evil babe from the poem, it’s because she’s almost entirely the invention of the screenwriters Roger Avary and Neil Gaiman and the director Robert Zemeckis, who together have plumped her up in words, deeds and curves. These creative interventions aren’t especially surprising given the source material and the nature of big-studio adaptations. There’s plenty of action in “Beowulf,” but even its more vigorous bloodletting pales next to its rich language, exotic setting and mythic grandeur. — Manohla Dargis, The New York Times

The Door the poem - Now, the movie

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=HL91uGhY3wo

My English friend Patrick McManus had a poem The Door in an anthology which someone in Amsterdam Library read - and made this charming movie out of. Move over Beowulf - here's another great epic to make the silver screen >g<

The Last Gibb River Supper

Mary Jane's


Ah, such a small gathering for our last supper together. It was at Sister Mary Jane's house - community nurse and a wonderful human being with a heart bigger than this planet. Tim Clear, principal of Wanalirri Catholic School up until this night, took over the carving. And little Pip, one of two Jack Russells owned by M J, wasn't going to miss out on the fun. There was thunder and lightning about, so Frank (the male JR) was safely tucked away in the closet. My wife Jeanette(pictured with MJ) and I were the other guests.

Sad to make such good friends and then have to leave them. MJ will be there at Gibb River Station all through The Wet, with a little break to see her family in Melbourne over Christmas. Tim will be with friends and family in Broome and Perth over the festive break, and Jen and I are back at home in Perth with our family and friends.

Panels from the Wanalirri Catholic School story hanging

I don't know that the story is mine to tell, but these are just some panels of the wonderful narrative in cloth on the wall at Wanalirri Catholic School where my wife Jeanette and I have just stopped teaching. It definitely qualifies as a remote community, stuck out there on the Gibb River Road a seven hour drive from Broome. & that's on a good day with the red dirt road flattened by a grader and no rain. Today Mt Elizabeth, a next door property, had the most rain in the last 24 hours in the state of Western Australia. The season known as The Wet is about to befall them all in The Kimberley which will make the Gibb River Road impassable and all airstrips closed once they are swamped. I wish my friends in that community well during this testing time where contact with the outside world is cut off and the community has to draw together to rely on its own scant resources.

New chapter for Meanjin literary magazine

from The Age, Melbourne's newspaper ...
Jason Steger
December 12, 2007

IF YOU ring the Carlton office of Meanjin a message says Ian Britain, the editor of the Melbourne literary magazine, is now available on a different number.

The message will disappear pretty soon, as will Britain, after a Melbourne University review of the 67-year-old magazine decided that it would be produced under the auspices — and in the offices of — Melbourne University Publishing.

The review was commissioned by university vice-chancellor Glyn Davis after a public wrangle between those who backed a plan for the administration and distribution of the magazine to be taken over by MUP and those who opposed it.

In May the Meanjin board accepted the proposal in a 4-3 vote, with MUP boss Louise Adler, a longtime board member, voting in favour and Britain voting against.

Britain, who is editing Meanjin's summer edition, a double issue to be published in February, said yesterday that he had not been informed of the outcome of the review and could not comment.

Among the review's recommendations are the creation of a charter of editorial independence; the winding up of the Meanjin Company; the establishment of an editorial advisory committee; and the appointment of a new editor.

Ms Adler said Meanjin would become an imprint of MUP. "It's a terrific partnership with a lot of opportunities for Meanjin for a safe berth as it moves into the 21st century."

She reiterated that there were no plans to make Meanjin an online publication. "I do think the first priority is to put the wonderful archives online. Meanjin needs an online presence but that doesn't undermine the print edition.

"While MUP still produces books there will be a print edition of Meanjin."

The review panel consisted of State Library chief executive Anne-Marie Schwirtlich, professor of Australian literature at Sydney University Robert Dixon, and RMIT publishing lecturer Michael Webster.

Within the System by Frederick Pollack

I remind myself not to be awed.
I can do something he can’t –
write – and was invited,
and am not the archetype that still,
beneath the prevailing academic blandness,
lurks and inspires: the drunken, mumbling,
wife-stealing poet. I’m an equal

except in assets. His assets
include the soaring ceiling, the hanging
halogen lamps that frame the arriving
guests like a production number
in a Sondheim, eight hundred feet
of books, and the bilious
gold and nervous umber

of a Braque of my favorite period:
recuperating from the head-wound … Plus
the spectacular wife, of whom the less said
the easier ... They show us round,
not boasting (except in their wine-cellar), not
self-deprecating, merely sharing.
Then the staff brings in food.

From the ceviche through the Caesar he speaks
of the possibilities of wind-farms (his
wind-farms), a kind of supersonic
traffic-cop to reroute migrations,
his interest in desalination. Seeks
always to treat the opposition
lawyers and CEOs, he says, as

people. One of the exotic
adopted children, defying bedtime,
enters, is hugged and tearlessly nannied
off. From the rosemary lamb and eggplant
parmigian until dessert the guests
hold forth: about some clinic, a program
for convicts; another, equally worthy kind

of program. I hold back but he draws
me out. I speak in a bland, academic
way (it sounds like someone else)
about my work. Downplay
my anarchomarxism. Make
my colleagues sound like public defenders,
case-workers. The surgeon knows

two names; the producer misquotes
Stevens. Our host seems disappointed,
says something about subjectivity
(or “possession”) I can’t quarrel with.
Over coffee the wife presides,
hair glowing in that light as if anointed;
and what she does is so

good, worthwhile, self-sacrificing
(not to mention the kids) that I can’t remember
what it is. The topic of pasts comes up.
“My mother was an addict,”
that husky, perfect or perfected voice
announces. “Of disaster, more
than anything. We moved

from shelter to shelter to SRO ...
I had a terrible early life.”
No silence supervenes – her tone
is neither doleful nor aggrieved –
till I ask, “Do you ever miss those days?”
and she says, “Yes. In a way. Yes,”
and suddenly equality is achieved.



Frederick Pollack is the author of two book-length narrative poems, The Adventure and Happiness, both published by Story Line Press. Other of his poems and essays have appeared in Hudson Review, Southern Review, Fulcrum, Salmagundi, Poetry Salzburg Review, Die Gazette (Munich), Representations and elsewhere. Poems have most recently appeared in the print journals Iota (UK), Orbis (UK), Naked Punch (UK), Magma (UK), and The Hat. Online, poems have appeared in Big Bridge, Snorkel, Hamilton Stone Review, Diagram, BlazeVox, The New Hampshire Review, Denver Syntax, Barnwood, elimae, Wheelhouse and elsewhere, and are forthcoming in Mudlark. Pollack is an adjunct professor of creative writing at George Washington University, Washington, DC.

Gibb River Frog

Gibb River frogs are very loud. Their sound is often like rasping thick rope over wood, perhaps on the edge of a pearl lugger. Other times (it may be a different species of frog), they balloon out sound in big green belches which rise in volume, stop, and start again. After rain they belch for hour after hour.

Two nights ago, after rain, we were watching Betty Blue, the Director’s Cut, on DVD, when a frog started up on the front verandah, just a thin glass window away from where we sat. The sex scenes were laughable with this green belching soundtrack, so I went outside to shoo him away. He sat solidly on the cement floor. I tried picking him up to move him into the bush but he jumped out of my hand before I had any sort of gentle grip – and landed on my bare foot, where he settled, quite comfortable. I laughed so much my wife came to see what was so funny but stayed back in horror. ‘O, what does he feel like?’ she asked. I replied, ‘Warm and wet, a bit like a freshly caught fish.’ He belched as punctuation, and I felt his fat Buddha body rise and fall on my foot. It felt like some kind of natural blessing, a benediction from the frog world. I would’ve chanted with him if I’d known his tongue.

Part this, part that ...

Okay, our roving friend Dolly managed to have pups some time ago, and we schemed to take one home with us to Perth when we depart from here in a week's time. But rules from vets and airlines, etc, make it impossible, so at least I can now introduce you to the three pups: Zimmy is the light coloured one, and the strongest of the bunch. She looks just like her mother. The middle one is Little Big-Ears because his dad is Big Ears and, you can't see them too well there, but the pup has two big ears that are outsize for his body >g< The littlest one is simply called The Runt, and I feel so sorry for her. She is pushed aside at any meal time and knocked flying inadvertently often by her mother's legs as she tries to suck.

One of the most engaging thing for us to see is that Big Ears, obvious dad to at least one pup, stays with Dolly and the pups all the time. They are a family unit. He definitely has dingo in him, as does Dolly, so maybe it is a dingo thing. I haven't known such patriarchal concern in other canine families I have known.