The Night of the Rambler is true to its title. It tells a story of a revolution rambling with plans on how to execute a coup d’état on a young government, perhaps too young to transform and reconfigure policies inherited from previous colonial administrations. The transition is mired with problems, which is not unusual: young governments in newly decolonized territories are still learning the ropes of being free. Like youth itself, these fledgling states are high on new-found independence or semi-independence. In this novel, that mindset disables effective government. A territory that such a state governs feels neglected and excluded from basic benefits and services. Ironically, here, the lack of organized surveillance through bureaucratic standards—which gave colonial administrations immense control—becomes a form of oppression: political marginalization, a loss of sovereignty that opens channels for organized protests. However, there is a twist in the revolution Montague Kobbé has fictionalized, which is not necessarily in the protest itself, but what it wants in the end: it prefers direct administration from its original colonizer. [Read Full Review at NewPages.]
Object Lessons: The Paris Review Presents the Art of the Short Story
A book can be judged by its cover, partially. This book is perfect example. The words Object Lessons: The Paris Review Presents the Art of the Short Story and the image of a typewriter below them compressed into a singular message for me: MFA in fiction. Even before opening the book, the cover tells me its target audience is creative writers, or more so, creative writers who are in a writing program, aspiring to be in one, used to be in one, are teaching in one, are about to teach in one, or believe you can’t teach creative writing, and thus look down on writing programs. But whether you stand by that idea or not, there’s a growing trend that these programs, academies, or institutes are sprouting around the globe. To name three, out of many: the City University of Hong Kong’s MFA in Creative Writing in English was launched in 2010, and considers itself “The only MFA with an Asian Focus.” In the UK, the Faber and Faber publishing house started Faber Academy in 2008, and promotes the idea that “publishers know what writers need.” And in City University of New York’s The Writers’ Institute at the Graduate Center, its director—novelist André Aciman—has brought in editors from publications and publishers such as Granta; Harper’s; Knopf; The New Yorker; Farrar, Straus and Giroux; and, yes, The Paris Review to facilitate its writing workshops, in fiction and nonfiction. [Read Full-text at NewPages.]
@ Munyori
My poem Consolations is published here, with a few others. Many thanks to Emmanuel, for including it.
Mornings give in to consolations.
The news anchor is part of the pattern that ensures
I will be home around six in the evening.
If I forget something on my way out,
it’s not the car keys, but the feel of your lips.
The bird blocking the green light
does not obliterate the other lights. The rearview mirror
swallows objects and takes them out of its face;
anything is game, big or small,
mountains and valleys, God, or how
the day might turn out to be.
The news anchor is part of the pattern that ensures
I will be home around six in the evening.
If I forget something on my way out,
it’s not the car keys, but the feel of your lips.
The bird blocking the green light
does not obliterate the other lights. The rearview mirror
swallows objects and takes them out of its face;
anything is game, big or small,
mountains and valleys, God, or how
the day might turn out to be.
Salton Sea
In this collection, interstate highways are stoned with sad songs, while accelerating on The Stones. They speed towards motel rooms and roadside bars, sweaty in premonitions of tomorrows through the Mojave Desert, or swanky Palm Springs hanging out on tan lines and glamour that might turn off George McCormick’s characters. His are not L.A. types, hoping for alternatives to traffic jams, smog, or specters of road rage. But they are not rural either; they are somewhere in between, suspended in that vast space girdled by truck stops, railroads, dry landscapes, and coffee refills on Sunset Boulevard, before accelerating the 101 or I-5 towards midnight and beyond. They take anything outside the nine-to-five hustle, anything stable, to support a family, a budding romance, or dreams that might wake, glimmering, in their baby daughter’s eyes. [Read Full-text at NewPages.]
Lucio
~
Thanks to Eileen Tabios for inviting me to be part of her manuscript-in-progress that explores the expanse of the self. More on Eileen's project in her website The Blind Chatelaine's Keys. A portion of that manuscript appears in the 29th issue of Otoliths edited by Mark Young, in a special feature called:
Featuring:
Eileen R. Tabios, Tom Beckett, j/j hastain, John Bloomberg-Rissman,
Aileen Ibardaloza, Thomas Fink, Sheila E. Murphy,
& Patrick James Dunagan & Ava Koohbor.
~
The issue features these writers and artists: Mark Cunningham, Susan Lewis, Aditya Bahl, Jal Nicholl, Andrew Topel, Pete Spence & Andrew Topel, Julian Jason Haladyn, Ed Baker, John Ryan, Francesco Aprile, Unconventional Press, Kyle Hemmings, Philip Byron Oakes, Marco Giovenale, Sheila E. Murphy & John M. Bennett, Jim Leftwich & John M. Bennett, Thomas M. Cassidy & John M. Bennett, John M. Bennett, John W. Sexton, Louie Crew, Sy Roth, Jack Galmitz, Anthony J. Langford, Mark Melnicove, Yoko Danno, Pam Brown, Eleanor Leonne Bennett, A. J. Huffman, John Veira, Maria Zajkowski, Camille Martin, Wayne Mason, Bobbi Lurie, Darren C. Demaree, Michael Stutz, James Mc Laughlin, Howie Good, Reed Altemus, Tammy Ho Lai-Ming, Johannes S. H. Bjerg, Vernon Frazer, Jeremy Freedman, John Pursch, dan raphael, Sheila e. Black & Caleb Puckett, Ricky Garni, Jack Collum & Mark DuCharme, Kathryn Yuen, Tim Wright, Mark Reep, Gary Barwin, Taylor Reid, harry k stammer, Marcia Arrieta, Anna Ryan-Punch, Katrinka Moore, Neil Ellman, Sally Ann McIntyre, Jeff Harrison, Joe Balaz, Boyd Spahr, Tony Beyer, Jim Davis, Chris Brown, Sam Moginie, Lakey Comess, Alberto Vitacchio, Jorge Lucio de Campos translated by Diana Magallón & Gregory Vincent St. Thomasino, Rebecca Rom-Frank, Craig Cotter, Javant Biarujia, Carla Bertola, Iain Britton, Anne Elvey, Bob Heman, Donna Fleischer, J. D. Nelson, sean burn, Spencer Selby, Charles Freeland & Rosaire Appel, Paul Dickey, Michael D Goscinski, Kathup Tsering, Miro Bilbrough, Chris Holdaway, Samuel Carey, Paul Pfleuger, Jr., Michael Brandonisio, Willie Smith, Mercedes Webb-Pullman, Bogdan Puslenghea, Andrew Pascoe, Scott Metz, Marty Hiatt, Eric Schmaltz, Sam Langer, & bruno neiva.
Engine Oil, Tombstones, & L.A.
Thanks to The Common (Amherst College),
for including my piece - "Instead of Flowers".
bubble bath issues anyone?
The Bubble Bath Issue of MiPOesias (Feb 2013)
Nin Andrews, Jennifer Koe, Joshua Gray, Ron Androla, Sam Gogolak, D.S. Martin, Pris Campbell, Rena Rossner, Meg Tuite, Linda Benninghoff, Laurie Kolp, Holly Simonsen, Erica Braverman, Gabrielle Freeman, Michael Caylo-Baradi & Yasbel Acuña-Borrero
I'm happy to be part of this issue. Thanks Didi for including my piece:
Persuasions.
Andre Aciman @ Granta
I like the idea that he can only write in the subjective I. The reading is energetic. I'm not lost. I love it. And I love his interviews. I get lost in the momentum.
Moments in the West
 |
| Add caption |
~
Otoliths 28
Alexander Jorgensen, Paul Dickey, Felino A. Soriano, Alexandra Yurkovsky, Jim Meirose, Simon Perchik, nick-e melville, Tim Suermondt, Mark Melnicove, Adam Aitken, bruno neiva, Philip Byron Oakes, Dane Karnick, Howie Good, Walter Ruhlmann, John Crouse, M. Pfaff, John M. Bennett, William Garvin, Michael Farrell, Willie Smith, Jack Galmitz, Craig Scott, Raymond Farr, Carlyle Baker, Patrick James Dunagan, Sheila E. Murphy, Reed Altemus, Micah Cavaleri, Tom Beckett, Tony Brinkley, Bobbi Lurie, Tom Pescatore, Cecelia Chapman, Tony Beyer, Lakey Comess, George McKim, Steven D. Stark, Orchid Tierney, David Dick, Colin Herd, Michael Caylo-Baradi, Lee Slonimsky, Chris D'Errico, Susan Gangel & Terry Turrentine, Catherine Vidler, John Pursch, Stephen Nelson, Leigh Herrick, Jeff Harrison, Volodymyr Bilyk, Charles Freeland & Rosaire Appel, Márton Koppány, Alyson Miller, sean burn, Donna Fleischer, Bogdan Puslenghea, Paul Pfleuger, Jr., Joel Chace, Bob Heman, Scott Metz, Ed Baker, J. D. Nelson, Nicolette Wong, Michael Brandonisio, Lance Newman, Sam Moginie, Kit Kennedy, Samit Roy, Sam Langer, Aditya Bahl, Cherie Hunter Day, Shazia Hafiz Ramji, & Michael Gottlieb.
Freighted Refuge (excerpt)
For full text, visit : Latin American Review of Books.
Clouds dominate the upper half in one of Sin Nombre‘s (2009) theatrical release posters, as though a tropical storm is tracking the freight train below, carrying passengers on its rooftop through lush-green countryside. This poster’s centre of gravity is a face, of a young woman looking straight at us, framed in delicate fortitude; and immediately behind her is a young man whose line of sight appears engaged on thoughts that vegetate on the tropical landscape the train is passing through.
A native of Honduras, Sayra is the young woman in the poster, played by rising Mexican-actor Paulina Gaitán, and the young man is Casper of Chiapas, Mexico, portrayed by non-professional actor Edgar Flores from Honduras. Two years before this film was released, Gaitán had worked with Kevin Kline in Trade (2007) as a Mexican girl auctioned online for paedophiles. There are vague traces of that girl’s fragility in Gaitán’s Sayra, whose solemn sweetness and strength provide illusions of respite against the script’s controlled accretion of violence embodied in La Mara Salvatrucha, a transnational gang with a chapter in the city of Tapachula in Chiapas, which Casper is a member of.
As a marero, Casper is wary about cultivating a private life; but he pursues one anyway, to nourish a budding romance – as Willy, not Casper – with Martha Marlene (Diana Garcia), whose fragile beauty appears out-of-place in the film’s harsh world, and is soon discarded after following Casper to a gang meeting in a cemetery. Casper immediately suffers punishment before his homies for hiding Martha from them, while their leader – Tenoch Huerta Mejia’s menacing Lil’ Mago – absconds her to a semi-private enclosure under the intimate shade of a tree. Fukunaga takes advantage of this scene for something that complements our perceptions of Lil’ Mago whose face and naked upper-body presents a delirious labyrinth of tattoos, dripping of death, religion, brotherhood, and other icons of pride. When Martha hits her head on a tombstone after resisting his advances and never moves again, the brief shock that freezes Lil’ Mago’s face appears like a seed for an apology to Casper later, who would never know her death was an accident. Instead, Lil’ Mago simply informs Casper that “the Devil took her,” after leaving Martha under the tree.
Martha’s death enrages Casper quietly, as Lil’ Mago continues to hold the plot’s momentum, when he chooses Casper and a new recruit named Smiley for a routine robbery on a freight train carrying US-bound migrants. Obligation and pride simmers in the new recruit’s sense of focus in collecting wallets and other material possessions, sentiments not replicated in Casper. Still mourning over Martha, Casper’s concentration to be in the robbery has been faltering, which Lil’ Mago has noted with friendly nonchalance, ever since the triumvirate boards the train discretely. However, the object of Casper’s concentration acquires a new focus when the gang leader puts his hand on one of the female passengers they are robbing. This harassment punctures Casper’s rage, and inspires him to rescue the girl. Soon, the energy of the script shifts into a narrative of escape after Casper raises his machete and lands its blade on the gang leader’s neck. Smiley’s flight from the interrupted robbery is burdened with confusion, fear, and the image of Lil’ Mago’s dead body with a leg now sliced in half on the tracks, after Casper pushes him down the boxcar rooftop they are on.
Now alone, Casper takes refuge on the train he once terrorized, and survives unsuccessful attempts against his life. Over time, the girl Casper saves – Sayra – develops feelings for him that forces her to separate with her father and uncle, to follow Casper who secretly leaves the train one morning. Casper and Sayra’s moments together deepen against Mara members in Mexico and the US now searching for Lil’ Mago’s assassin, a hunt that ends where Casper’s blood converges with the color of the setting sun on the Rio Grande River, while Sayra crosses its dark waters alone.
Clouds dominate the upper half in one of Sin Nombre‘s (2009) theatrical release posters, as though a tropical storm is tracking the freight train below, carrying passengers on its rooftop through lush-green countryside. This poster’s centre of gravity is a face, of a young woman looking straight at us, framed in delicate fortitude; and immediately behind her is a young man whose line of sight appears engaged on thoughts that vegetate on the tropical landscape the train is passing through.
A native of Honduras, Sayra is the young woman in the poster, played by rising Mexican-actor Paulina Gaitán, and the young man is Casper of Chiapas, Mexico, portrayed by non-professional actor Edgar Flores from Honduras. Two years before this film was released, Gaitán had worked with Kevin Kline in Trade (2007) as a Mexican girl auctioned online for paedophiles. There are vague traces of that girl’s fragility in Gaitán’s Sayra, whose solemn sweetness and strength provide illusions of respite against the script’s controlled accretion of violence embodied in La Mara Salvatrucha, a transnational gang with a chapter in the city of Tapachula in Chiapas, which Casper is a member of.
As a marero, Casper is wary about cultivating a private life; but he pursues one anyway, to nourish a budding romance – as Willy, not Casper – with Martha Marlene (Diana Garcia), whose fragile beauty appears out-of-place in the film’s harsh world, and is soon discarded after following Casper to a gang meeting in a cemetery. Casper immediately suffers punishment before his homies for hiding Martha from them, while their leader – Tenoch Huerta Mejia’s menacing Lil’ Mago – absconds her to a semi-private enclosure under the intimate shade of a tree. Fukunaga takes advantage of this scene for something that complements our perceptions of Lil’ Mago whose face and naked upper-body presents a delirious labyrinth of tattoos, dripping of death, religion, brotherhood, and other icons of pride. When Martha hits her head on a tombstone after resisting his advances and never moves again, the brief shock that freezes Lil’ Mago’s face appears like a seed for an apology to Casper later, who would never know her death was an accident. Instead, Lil’ Mago simply informs Casper that “the Devil took her,” after leaving Martha under the tree.
Martha’s death enrages Casper quietly, as Lil’ Mago continues to hold the plot’s momentum, when he chooses Casper and a new recruit named Smiley for a routine robbery on a freight train carrying US-bound migrants. Obligation and pride simmers in the new recruit’s sense of focus in collecting wallets and other material possessions, sentiments not replicated in Casper. Still mourning over Martha, Casper’s concentration to be in the robbery has been faltering, which Lil’ Mago has noted with friendly nonchalance, ever since the triumvirate boards the train discretely. However, the object of Casper’s concentration acquires a new focus when the gang leader puts his hand on one of the female passengers they are robbing. This harassment punctures Casper’s rage, and inspires him to rescue the girl. Soon, the energy of the script shifts into a narrative of escape after Casper raises his machete and lands its blade on the gang leader’s neck. Smiley’s flight from the interrupted robbery is burdened with confusion, fear, and the image of Lil’ Mago’s dead body with a leg now sliced in half on the tracks, after Casper pushes him down the boxcar rooftop they are on.
Now alone, Casper takes refuge on the train he once terrorized, and survives unsuccessful attempts against his life. Over time, the girl Casper saves – Sayra – develops feelings for him that forces her to separate with her father and uncle, to follow Casper who secretly leaves the train one morning. Casper and Sayra’s moments together deepen against Mara members in Mexico and the US now searching for Lil’ Mago’s assassin, a hunt that ends where Casper’s blood converges with the color of the setting sun on the Rio Grande River, while Sayra crosses its dark waters alone.
You can read the full-text here.
How to light the air
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| Image Source: Boston Globe: Big Picture. |
It comes, as passing moments, and walks through footsteps, their destinations, fragile calamities. We hurry, and take what is necessary, what we must, including what is cropped out of the image, the one where you simplified us in a gesture.
@ The Center For Fiction
The sound of steps on wooden floor and controlled applause. It was a beautiful night.
Titanic at 100 years
The story of this ship will always float. And no berg of any sort will threaten to sink that. But it merely floats, and has no recognizable destination at the moment. I'm now curious about its future stopovers, especially how the hyper-active imagination of literature and film can reshape that narrative into their own terms. So far, the love-affair of nostalgia and curiosity in this story has been steamy. James Cameron exposed that into a highly marketable commodity. But love-affairs have definite life-spans. Usually, they're short. Although 'short', in this regard, could be highly elastic. Let's see. Another two centuries? That's short in terms of light years. The future could further exhume the remains of that ship, and raise it using technology we can only imagine today.
Tailgating is not always intentional
 |
| @ 42nd Street & 5th Avenue (2012) |
Cars disappear into someone's gestures. The longer you look into a photograph in your wallet, you see shapes, borders, and silhouettes.
Above may not be sky, but an indication of intransigence, that perhaps you're moving away from the temptation of apogees, dreams, conquests.
Above may not be sky, but an indication of intransigence, that perhaps you're moving away from the temptation of apogees, dreams, conquests.
In the silence of a train station, empty seats refuse to yield into metaphors, especially as hints of something exiled. Even the way we used to hold each other's hands that last time I saw you, their fingerprints were already uncoiled in what you might not want to say,
but instead became a way of looking at clouds from your window seat.
but instead became a way of looking at clouds from your window seat.
Meet Me There
 |
| Empire State Building (March 2012) |
The night expands into shadows on sidewalks, in steps hurrying to catch the next train, or as they walk into a park to sit on a bench and rest. Breezes caress cheeks, gestures, or trail punctuations in a conversation. Cars converge and diverge into routes, pre-meditations, or failed plans. She keeps looking at her watch, at what its numbers tell her, their power over her expectations. There's the sky to look at. But her eyes don't look beyond the branches of trees without leaves. Her mind settles on the sound of steps, at what they are up to. She can still feel him in these nameless faces, his touch, the movement of his palms on her, where they pursue her. He takes her further in her closed eyes, into where trees hide between city-streets, between tongues that know what each cannot feel.
Sidewalk, Subway, Sandwich
The sidewalk looked wide last night. I wasn't in a hurry to go home, even though it was already midnight. Even the cars passing by looked relaxed and calm. I thought of getting coffee, but decided to catch the subway home. At the subway platform, I kept looking at the tracks, at their color, at food wrappers and other garbage sitting between them. I don't remember now how many commuters were standing near me. The place was quiet. When the train arrived, I didn't want to sit, but ended up sitting. As always, I picked a couple of points above or near the bench across me to keep looking at, an advertisement, the glass window, or anything, to avoid looking at other passengers. One time in a crowded train, I kept looking at a famous face in an ad, a news anchor. Most of the time though, I read ad captions that sound like proverbs, or sayings. At my stop, I found a well-lighted deli, and ordered a sandwich. Most of the tables there were empty, and thought of eating my order facing the door. But I decided to eat it slowly in my room, in front of my computer, and watched a indie film on DVD from the library. It's one of those stories that try to connect multiple stories together. This one won a major award on the other side of the pond. Later, I read a short story, and tried to read two more. I think I'll read them again.Empire State Building
 |
Last night, I walked through a drizzle of snow flurries on 5th Ave, from 34th to 14th and back. I had been checking out a merchandise on the web, and wanted to see it in-person before buying it. And since I liked what I saw, I went home with it. The streets were busy and wet outside the store, and I felt like walking around for a while. Pizza was in my mind, or food from a truck-stand. But I ended up getting a subway sandwich at a place near 32nd. After leaving the fast-food restaurant, I stood on the sidewalk for a while, looked around, then up. The lights on the upper part of the Empire State Building were on, and created an effect; it looked immersed in a halo, or that its height blocked my line of sight to a full moon on a semi-cloudy sky. I took a couple of snapshots, before heading to the Grand Central Station. On my way there, I borrowed some videos at the Mid-Manhattan Library. Costa-Gavra's Missing - a political drama set in the 1973 coup in Chile - wasn't that bad, when I saw it later. The main characters in the story - played by Jack Lemmon and Sissy Spacek - are residents of the empire state.
Galatea Resurrects #17
Issue No. 17 TABLE OF CONTENTS
[N.B. You can scroll down on blog or click on highlighted names or titles to go directly to the referenced article.]
EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION
Eileen Tabios
NEW REVIEWS
Nicholas Manning Reviews IRRESPONSIBILITY by Chris Vitiello
Patrick James Dunagan Reviews HOW PHENOMENA APPEAR TO UNFOLD by Leslie Scalapino
Allen Bramhall Reviews AT THAT by Skip Fox
T.C. Marshall Reviews ETHICS OF SLEEP by Bernadette Mayer
Fiona Sze-Lorrain Reviews SELF-PORTRAIT WITH CRAYON by Allison Benis White
Laura Trantham Smith Reviews UTOPIA MINUS by Susan Briante
Moira Richards Reviews IN PARAN by Larissa Shmailo
Philip Troy Reviews THE FEELING IS ACTUAL by Paolo Javier
Eileen Tabios Engages THERE ARE PEOPLE WHO THINK THAT PAINTERS SHOULDN’T TALK: A GUSTONBOOK by Patrick James Dunagan
Logan Fry Reviews IN THE COMMON DREAM OF GEORGE OPPEN by Joseph Bradshaw
Eileen Tabios Engages TO BE HUMAN IS TO BE A CONVERSATION by Andrea Rexilius
Thomas Fink Reviews PARTS AND OTHER PIECES by Tom Beckett
T.C. Marshall Reviews TO LIGHT OUT by Karen Weiser and DUTIES OF AN ENGLISH FOREIGN SECRETARY by MacGregor Card
Allen Bramhall Reviews CITIZEN CAIN by Ben Friedlander
William Allegrezza Reviews FORTY-NINE GUARANTEED WAYS TO ESCAPE DEATH by Sandy McIntosh
Fiona Sze-Lorrain Reviews THERE’S THE HAND AND THERE’S THE ARID CHAIR by Tomaz Salamun
Eileen Tabios Engages MY LIFE AS A DOLL by Elizabeth Kirschner
Gabriel Lovatt Reviews THE USE OF SPEECH by Nathalie Sarraute, translated from the French by Barbara Wright
Logan Fry Reviews PORTRAIT OF COLON DASH PARENTHESIS by Jeffrey Jullich
Eileen Tabios Engages STILL: OF THE EARTH AS THE ARK WHICH DOES NOT MOVE by Matthew Cooperman
Bill Scalia Reviews THE URGE TO BELIEVE IS STRONGER THAN BELIEF ITSELF by Erin M. Bertram
Kristin Berkey-Abbot Reviews FAULKNER’S ROSARY by Sarah Vap
Micah Cavaleri Reviews KYOTOLOGIC by Anne Gorrick
Tom Beckett Engages AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MY GENDER, PRURIENT OMNIBUS ANARCHIC, RESTITUTIONS FOR A NEWER BOUNTIFUL VERB, COCK-BURN, OUR BODIES . . . ARE BEAUTY INDUCERS, THE ULTERIOR EDEN, ASYMPTOTIC LOVER//THERMODYNAMIC VENTS, all by j/j hastain
j/j hastain Reviews A GOOD CUNTBOY IS HARD TO FIND by Doug Rice
Eileen Tabios Engages 60 TEXTOS by Sarah Riggs
Bill Scalia Reviews BEAT THING by David Meltzer
Logan Fry Reviews HANK by Abraham Smith
T.C. Marshall Reviews EXPLORATIONS IN NAVAJO POETRY AND POETICS by Anthony K. Webster and THE PRINCIPLE OF MEASURE IN COMPOSITION BY FIELD: PROJECTIVE VERSE II by Charles Olson, Ed. Joshue Hoeynck
Eileen Tabios Engages TEENY TINY #13, Edited by Amanda Laughtland
Allen Bramhall Reviews ANTIPHONIES: ESSAYS ON WOMEN'S EXPERIMENTAL POETRIES IN CANADA, Ed. Nate Dorward
Gabriel Lovatt Reviews VACANT LOT by Oliver Rohe, translated from the French by Laird Hunt
Eric Wayne Dickey Reviews PUNISH HONEY by Karen Leona Anderson
Eileen Tabios Engages INSIDE THE MONEY MACHINE by Minnie Bruce Pratt
Pam Brown Reviews SLY MONGOOSE by Ken Bolton
T.C. Marshall Reviews HOW LONG by Ron Padgett
Neil Leadbeater Reviews A HERON IN BUENOS AIRES by Luis Benítez
Jean Vengua Reviews THE WISDOM ANTHOLOGY OF NORTH AMERICAN BUDDHIST POETRY, Editor Andrew Schelling
Eileen Tabios Engages WAIFS AND STRAYS by Micah Ballard
T.C. Marshall Reviews THE NEW TOURISM by Harry Mathews
Guillermo Parra Reviews HOW’S THE COWS by Jess Mynes
T.C. Marshall Reviews THE WIDE ROAD by Carla Harryman and Lyn Hejinian
John Bloomberg-Rissman Reviews THE COMMONS by Sean Bonney
Pam Brown Reviews PERRIER FEVER by Pete Spence
Jim McCrary Engages MARROWING and THE NAME OF THIS INTERSECTION IS FROST, both by Maryrose Larkin
Tom Beckett Reviews THE NAME OF THIS INTERSECTION IS FROST by Maryrose Larkin
Patrick James Dunagan Reviews “NEITHER WIT NOR GOLD” by Ammiel Alcalay and STREET METE: VERTICAL ELEGIES 6 by Sam Truitt
Eileen Tabios Engages RADIATOR by NF Huth
Genevieve Kaplan Reviews SPEAKING OFF CENTRE by James Cummins, CORPORATE GEES (VOLUME V) by Christopher William Purdom, KITCHEN TIDBITS by Amanda Laughtland, FROM HERE by Zoë Skoulding with images by Simonetta Moro, and TWO HATS APPEAR WHEN APPLAUDED: AN IMPROVISATION by Raymond Farr
L.S. Bassen Reviews IT MIGHT TURN OUT WE ARE REAL by Susan Scarlata
rob mclennan Reviews THREE NOVELS by Elizabeth Robinson
Patrick James Dunagan & Ava Koohbor Review THE TELLER OF TALES: STORIES FROM FERODWSI’S SHAHNAHMEN, Translated by Richard Jeffrey Newman
Tom Hibbard Reviews SELECTED POEMS by Nick Demske, A MYSTICAL THEOLOGY OF THE LIMBIC FISSURE by Peter O’Leary, HOSTILE WITNESS by Garin Cycholl, UNABLE TO FULLY CALIFORNIA by Larry Sawyer, AIN’T GOT ALL NIGHT by Buck Downs, and ANSWER by Mark DuCharme
Jeff Harrison Engages THE DANGEROUS ISLANDS (A NOVEL) by Séamas Cain
Eileen Tabios Engages ALIENS: AN ISLAND by Uljana Wolf, Trans. from the German by Monika Zobel
Kristin Berkey-Abbot Reviews LOOKING UP HARRYETTE MULLEN: INTERVIEWS ON SLEEPING WITH THE DICTIONARY AND OTHER WORKS by Barbara Henning
G. Justin Hulog Reviews ARCHIPELAGO DUST by Karen Llagas
Allen Bramhall Reviews FRAGILE REPLACEMENTS by William Allegrezza
Eileen Tabios Engages RED WALLS by James Tolan
Juliet Cook Reviews COMPENDIUM by Kristina Marie Darling
Bill Scalia Reviews WHAT THE RAVEN SAID by Robert Alexander
Fiona Sze-Lorrain Reviews SEE HOW WE ALMOST FLY by Alison Luterman
Sunnylynn Thibodeaux Reviews THE INCOMPOSSIBLE by Carrie Hunter
John Bloomberg-Rissman Reviews 908-1078 and THE PERSIANS BY AESCHYLUS, both by Brandon Brown
Benjamin Winkler Reviews WE IN MY TRANS by j/j hastain
Mary Kasimor Reviews T&U&/LASH YOUR NIPPLES TO A POST/HISTORY IS GORGEOUS by Jared Schickling
Jeff Harrison Engages T&U& LASH YOUR NIPPLES TO A POST HISTORY IS GORGEOUS by Jared Schickling
rob mclennan Reviews APOLLINAIRE’S SPEECH TO THE WAR MEDIC by Jake Kennedy
Megan Burns Reviews LUCKY by Mairéad Byrne and A REDUCTION by Jimmy Lo
Paul Lai Engages KĒROTAKIS : by Janice Lee
Patrick James Dunagan Reviews CLEARVIEW by Ted Greenwald and THE PUBLIC GARDENS: POEMS AND HISTORY by Linda Norton
John Bloomberg-Rissman Reviews KAZOO DREAMBOATS OR, ON WHAT THERE IS by J.H. Prynne
Gregory W. Randall Reviews THE HOMELESSNESS OF SELF by Susan Terris
Jim McCrary Reviews MY COMMON HEART by Anne Boyer and ISSUE 8, Newsletter from James Yeary
Megan Burns Reviews A TOAST IN THE HOUSE OF FRIENDS by Akilah Oliver
Eileen Tabios Engages INFO RATION by Stan Apps
Bill Scalia Reviews THE MORNING NEWS IS EXCITING by Don Mee Choi
Micah Cavaleri Reviews ACOUSTIC EXPERIENCE by Noah Eli Gordon
Jim McCrary Reviews COLLECTION by Megan Kaminski, MANTIC SEMANTIC by A.L. Nielsen, LVNGinTONGUES by G. E. Schwartz, and PO DOOM by jim mccrary
Eileen Tabios Engages BLUE COLLAR POET by G. Emil Reutter
Fiona Sze-Lorrain Reviews IF NOT METAMORPHIC by Brenda Iljima
Eileen Tabios Engages THE ULTERIOR EDEN: A SERIES OF GENUFLECTIONS, RUMINATIONS AND GYROSCOPES by j/j hastain
INTERVIEW
Tom Beckett Interviews NF Huth
FEATURE ARTICLE
“Make a Wish…and Blow out the Candles: An Explication of Tennessee Williams’s The Glass Menagerie” by Nicholas T. Spatafora
THE CRITIC WRITES POEMS
Sunnylyn Thibodeaux
FROM OFFLINE TO ONLINE
Paul Lai Reviews AUTOMATON BIOGRAPHIES by Larissa Lai
ADVERTISEMENTS
Poets on the Great Recession: Poets reflect on the Great Recession, and its impact on their Poetry. Because
Poets On Adoption:
Poetry: it inevitably relates to -- among others -- identity, history, culture, class, race, community, economics, politics, power, loss, health, desire, regret, language, form and genre disruption, love ... as well as the absences thereofs. The same may be said about Adoption."
BACK COVER
A Thousand Words Plus...!
EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION
Eileen Tabios
NEW REVIEWS
Nicholas Manning Reviews IRRESPONSIBILITY by Chris Vitiello
Patrick James Dunagan Reviews HOW PHENOMENA APPEAR TO UNFOLD by Leslie Scalapino
Allen Bramhall Reviews AT THAT by Skip Fox
T.C. Marshall Reviews ETHICS OF SLEEP by Bernadette Mayer
Fiona Sze-Lorrain Reviews SELF-PORTRAIT WITH CRAYON by Allison Benis White
Laura Trantham Smith Reviews UTOPIA MINUS by Susan Briante
Moira Richards Reviews IN PARAN by Larissa Shmailo
Philip Troy Reviews THE FEELING IS ACTUAL by Paolo Javier
Eileen Tabios Engages THERE ARE PEOPLE WHO THINK THAT PAINTERS SHOULDN’T TALK: A GUSTONBOOK by Patrick James Dunagan
Logan Fry Reviews IN THE COMMON DREAM OF GEORGE OPPEN by Joseph Bradshaw
Eileen Tabios Engages TO BE HUMAN IS TO BE A CONVERSATION by Andrea Rexilius
Thomas Fink Reviews PARTS AND OTHER PIECES by Tom Beckett
T.C. Marshall Reviews TO LIGHT OUT by Karen Weiser and DUTIES OF AN ENGLISH FOREIGN SECRETARY by MacGregor Card
Allen Bramhall Reviews CITIZEN CAIN by Ben Friedlander
William Allegrezza Reviews FORTY-NINE GUARANTEED WAYS TO ESCAPE DEATH by Sandy McIntosh
Fiona Sze-Lorrain Reviews THERE’S THE HAND AND THERE’S THE ARID CHAIR by Tomaz Salamun
Eileen Tabios Engages MY LIFE AS A DOLL by Elizabeth Kirschner
Gabriel Lovatt Reviews THE USE OF SPEECH by Nathalie Sarraute, translated from the French by Barbara Wright
Logan Fry Reviews PORTRAIT OF COLON DASH PARENTHESIS by Jeffrey Jullich
Eileen Tabios Engages STILL: OF THE EARTH AS THE ARK WHICH DOES NOT MOVE by Matthew Cooperman
Bill Scalia Reviews THE URGE TO BELIEVE IS STRONGER THAN BELIEF ITSELF by Erin M. Bertram
Kristin Berkey-Abbot Reviews FAULKNER’S ROSARY by Sarah Vap
Micah Cavaleri Reviews KYOTOLOGIC by Anne Gorrick
Tom Beckett Engages AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MY GENDER, PRURIENT OMNIBUS ANARCHIC, RESTITUTIONS FOR A NEWER BOUNTIFUL VERB, COCK-BURN, OUR BODIES . . . ARE BEAUTY INDUCERS, THE ULTERIOR EDEN, ASYMPTOTIC LOVER//THERMODYNAMIC VENTS, all by j/j hastain
j/j hastain Reviews A GOOD CUNTBOY IS HARD TO FIND by Doug Rice
Eileen Tabios Engages 60 TEXTOS by Sarah Riggs
Bill Scalia Reviews BEAT THING by David Meltzer
Logan Fry Reviews HANK by Abraham Smith
T.C. Marshall Reviews EXPLORATIONS IN NAVAJO POETRY AND POETICS by Anthony K. Webster and THE PRINCIPLE OF MEASURE IN COMPOSITION BY FIELD: PROJECTIVE VERSE II by Charles Olson, Ed. Joshue Hoeynck
Eileen Tabios Engages TEENY TINY #13, Edited by Amanda Laughtland
Allen Bramhall Reviews ANTIPHONIES: ESSAYS ON WOMEN'S EXPERIMENTAL POETRIES IN CANADA, Ed. Nate Dorward
Gabriel Lovatt Reviews VACANT LOT by Oliver Rohe, translated from the French by Laird Hunt
Eric Wayne Dickey Reviews PUNISH HONEY by Karen Leona Anderson
Eileen Tabios Engages INSIDE THE MONEY MACHINE by Minnie Bruce Pratt
Pam Brown Reviews SLY MONGOOSE by Ken Bolton
T.C. Marshall Reviews HOW LONG by Ron Padgett
Neil Leadbeater Reviews A HERON IN BUENOS AIRES by Luis Benítez
Jean Vengua Reviews THE WISDOM ANTHOLOGY OF NORTH AMERICAN BUDDHIST POETRY, Editor Andrew Schelling
Eileen Tabios Engages WAIFS AND STRAYS by Micah Ballard
T.C. Marshall Reviews THE NEW TOURISM by Harry Mathews
Guillermo Parra Reviews HOW’S THE COWS by Jess Mynes
T.C. Marshall Reviews THE WIDE ROAD by Carla Harryman and Lyn Hejinian
John Bloomberg-Rissman Reviews THE COMMONS by Sean Bonney
Pam Brown Reviews PERRIER FEVER by Pete Spence
Jim McCrary Engages MARROWING and THE NAME OF THIS INTERSECTION IS FROST, both by Maryrose Larkin
Tom Beckett Reviews THE NAME OF THIS INTERSECTION IS FROST by Maryrose Larkin
Patrick James Dunagan Reviews “NEITHER WIT NOR GOLD” by Ammiel Alcalay and STREET METE: VERTICAL ELEGIES 6 by Sam Truitt
Eileen Tabios Engages RADIATOR by NF Huth
Genevieve Kaplan Reviews SPEAKING OFF CENTRE by James Cummins, CORPORATE GEES (VOLUME V) by Christopher William Purdom, KITCHEN TIDBITS by Amanda Laughtland, FROM HERE by Zoë Skoulding with images by Simonetta Moro, and TWO HATS APPEAR WHEN APPLAUDED: AN IMPROVISATION by Raymond Farr
L.S. Bassen Reviews IT MIGHT TURN OUT WE ARE REAL by Susan Scarlata
rob mclennan Reviews THREE NOVELS by Elizabeth Robinson
Patrick James Dunagan & Ava Koohbor Review THE TELLER OF TALES: STORIES FROM FERODWSI’S SHAHNAHMEN, Translated by Richard Jeffrey Newman
Tom Hibbard Reviews SELECTED POEMS by Nick Demske, A MYSTICAL THEOLOGY OF THE LIMBIC FISSURE by Peter O’Leary, HOSTILE WITNESS by Garin Cycholl, UNABLE TO FULLY CALIFORNIA by Larry Sawyer, AIN’T GOT ALL NIGHT by Buck Downs, and ANSWER by Mark DuCharme
Jeff Harrison Engages THE DANGEROUS ISLANDS (A NOVEL) by Séamas Cain
Eileen Tabios Engages ALIENS: AN ISLAND by Uljana Wolf, Trans. from the German by Monika Zobel
Kristin Berkey-Abbot Reviews LOOKING UP HARRYETTE MULLEN: INTERVIEWS ON SLEEPING WITH THE DICTIONARY AND OTHER WORKS by Barbara Henning
G. Justin Hulog Reviews ARCHIPELAGO DUST by Karen Llagas
Allen Bramhall Reviews FRAGILE REPLACEMENTS by William Allegrezza
Eileen Tabios Engages RED WALLS by James Tolan
Juliet Cook Reviews COMPENDIUM by Kristina Marie Darling
Bill Scalia Reviews WHAT THE RAVEN SAID by Robert Alexander
Fiona Sze-Lorrain Reviews SEE HOW WE ALMOST FLY by Alison Luterman
Sunnylynn Thibodeaux Reviews THE INCOMPOSSIBLE by Carrie Hunter
John Bloomberg-Rissman Reviews 908-1078 and THE PERSIANS BY AESCHYLUS, both by Brandon Brown
Benjamin Winkler Reviews WE IN MY TRANS by j/j hastain
Mary Kasimor Reviews T&U&/LASH YOUR NIPPLES TO A POST/HISTORY IS GORGEOUS by Jared Schickling
Jeff Harrison Engages T&U& LASH YOUR NIPPLES TO A POST HISTORY IS GORGEOUS by Jared Schickling
rob mclennan Reviews APOLLINAIRE’S SPEECH TO THE WAR MEDIC by Jake Kennedy
Megan Burns Reviews LUCKY by Mairéad Byrne and A REDUCTION by Jimmy Lo
Paul Lai Engages KĒROTAKIS : by Janice Lee
Patrick James Dunagan Reviews CLEARVIEW by Ted Greenwald and THE PUBLIC GARDENS: POEMS AND HISTORY by Linda Norton
John Bloomberg-Rissman Reviews KAZOO DREAMBOATS OR, ON WHAT THERE IS by J.H. Prynne
Gregory W. Randall Reviews THE HOMELESSNESS OF SELF by Susan Terris
Jim McCrary Reviews MY COMMON HEART by Anne Boyer and ISSUE 8, Newsletter from James Yeary
Megan Burns Reviews A TOAST IN THE HOUSE OF FRIENDS by Akilah Oliver
Eileen Tabios Engages INFO RATION by Stan Apps
Bill Scalia Reviews THE MORNING NEWS IS EXCITING by Don Mee Choi
Micah Cavaleri Reviews ACOUSTIC EXPERIENCE by Noah Eli Gordon
Jim McCrary Reviews COLLECTION by Megan Kaminski, MANTIC SEMANTIC by A.L. Nielsen, LVNGinTONGUES by G. E. Schwartz, and PO DOOM by jim mccrary
Eileen Tabios Engages BLUE COLLAR POET by G. Emil Reutter
Fiona Sze-Lorrain Reviews IF NOT METAMORPHIC by Brenda Iljima
Eileen Tabios Engages THE ULTERIOR EDEN: A SERIES OF GENUFLECTIONS, RUMINATIONS AND GYROSCOPES by j/j hastain
INTERVIEW
Tom Beckett Interviews NF Huth
FEATURE ARTICLE
“Make a Wish…and Blow out the Candles: An Explication of Tennessee Williams’s The Glass Menagerie” by Nicholas T. Spatafora
THE CRITIC WRITES POEMS
Sunnylyn Thibodeaux
FROM OFFLINE TO ONLINE
Paul Lai Reviews AUTOMATON BIOGRAPHIES by Larissa Lai
ADVERTISEMENTS
Poets on the Great Recession: Poets reflect on the Great Recession, and its impact on their Poetry. Because
"To bring the poem into the world / is to bring the world into the poem."
Poets On Adoption:
Poetry: it inevitably relates to -- among others -- identity, history, culture, class, race, community, economics, politics, power, loss, health, desire, regret, language, form and genre disruption, love ... as well as the absences thereofs. The same may be said about Adoption."
BACK COVER
A Thousand Words Plus...!
Early this year, I wrote another boring confession.
I’m a bit of a whore, like many. But I’m not talking about the
kind of whore – from either gender – who uses a busy street-corner after
midnight, baiting clients with smooth or rusty marketing skills learned
from the Do-It-Yourself School of Charm, nor the veteran from those
corners who has learned to advertise who they are into discreet
information on business cards that directs potential costumers to their
pimp’s phone number. I’m talking about whorishness derived from
excessive habits to satisfy specific needs, the kind akin to mental
habits that make one a media whore, vampire-movie whore, trend whore,
or, yes, thrift-shop whore. These habits can easily be categorized as
obsessions, although that description must be used with caution, since
these kinds of whores, in general, have some awareness about being
controlled by their fixations, and are, therefore, wary they don't
fall into traps that convince them they have, indeed, become
qualified, resolute suckers.
I’m a thrift-shop whore, not because thrift shops are great places to
hang out and connect with other people from Facebook or elsewhere who
like used stuff, but because, as many of you know, there are
great merchandise there that probably won’t hurt you, at the cash
register. However, I’m not always seduced by the lure of cheap
merchandise in these stores, but only spend on things I can use, and do not
go through withdrawal symptoms or anxiety attacks, if I end up empty
handed on my two previous visits there. Thus, in the arena of
thrift-shop whoredom, I’m, categorically, a mild thrift-shop whore.
Although I may have been an intense thrift-shop whore once, for a brief,
unmemorable period, spending mindlessly on anything, even though I
didn’t have much to spend. Indeed, these stores are heaven for the
underpaid, although the parking lot of most used stores I patronize
somehow tells me my co-shoppers have healthy bank accounts, can easily
splurge at pricier stores, or may even be donors themselves of
merchandise sold in these used stores. But then perhaps they have been
thrift-store whores since their undergrad years at a public or private
university, a period sustained by student-loan programs or depleted
trust funds, and cannot evolve out of being bargain hunters.
Years ago, I became a regular at a neighborhood used-store, to look
for brand-name sneakers. Adidas, Nike, and Puma were the usual
brand-names I looked for. I used to shop once a month there, and only
spend fifteen to thirty minutes at the men’s shoe-rack, looking for a
great steal, then a few minutes to browse t-shirts, before leaving. But
those were the good old days, before I became a thrift-shop whore. These
days, I’m a weekly bargain hunter, not only looking for shoes and
t-shirts but also for sweaters, pants, bags, books, and music cds.
The cd display shelves have become my focal-point, in these weekly
two-hour visits, which now consumes half of my time, looking for
anything that catches my eye, such as any old albums by U2, Maroon 5,
Nora Jones, Marvin Gaye, Chopin, Cher, Schubert, Madonna, or Carlos
Santana.
But the music section has not derailed me from the men’s shoe-racks,
which I check carefully, because a great catch could be hidden under the
gigantic size-thirteens or fourteens. Usually, shoe-racks for men, in
most used stores I frequent, are nothing compared to shoe-racks for
women. Women used-store shoppers have more selections to choose from.
This probably means women think more about their feet than men, in terms
of care and ways of dressing them up. But just because men used-store
shoppers do not have an array of shoes to choose from doesn’t mean they
are locked out of getting a great steal. In many ways though, this
particular scarcity -as in life, in general- summons sharpened
hunter-gatherer skills among men shoppers there, to not only look for
shoes around the men’s shoe section, but into the women’s shoe section
as well.
Now this ceremonious spatial-expansion, in shoe bargain hunting, does
not mean these men are trying to satisfy the feminine aspect of their
tastes, nor are they necessarily expressing some uncontrolled fetish for
women’s shoes, revealed in a thrift-store public-sphere, that may later
inspire details for a story or theoretical paper. Not quite. These men
wander into the women’s shoe section to look for stray men’s shoes,
amidst the general chaos of voices, leathery shoe-smell, and, yes,
feet-smell, in that section. Often, men’s shoes are misplaced in the
women’s display racks, because of children who make toys out of anything
that catch the regimes of their tastes, besides shoes their mothers are
trying to browse through; and since their mothers are busy fitting
shoes, these children wander to a nearby rack -the men’s area, usually-
where they can resume the summer of boisterous play, while still within
the general scope of their mother’s or auntie’s highly-distracted
peripheral vision.
For the full-text that - I think - needs editing, please visit Thought Catalog.
Ronald Ventura: A Thousand Islands
oil on canvas; 60 x 96 in. (152.4 x 243.8 cm)
The body depicted in the center of the image is the kind of white that do not quite exist in the complexion of a human being in real-life, almost bond-paper white. This is the white of death's skin, drained of blood, sucked by elements thirsty of that liquid, the essence of its life; thus the body's external form here is left intact, like a marble statue, meant for display. But the presence of fruits before this body suggests it is some sort of god, surrounded by colorful offerings from plant life. Unfortunately, this god is not awake, perhaps too exhausted to pay attention to what's going on, or - as suggested above - simply dead. On the other hand, when one looks closer at this god, one notices its other head - or the extension of that head - is of a pig's, also lifeless, now a culinary delight, roasted, the heart of some tropical fiesta, celebration, gluttony.
Frank's Pizza
After dropping some books at the Epiphany Library on 23rd Street last night, I ate a slice of pizza. I think that was Frank who took my order. He wasn't as friendly as the review below claims he is, and looked tired. Maybe he didn't want me to be there. I don't know. However, there was a woman who looked friendly. I think that was his wife. She gave me my slice of sausage pizza, fresh from the oven. For a Saturday night, the place was quiet. I assume this is the reason why Frank looked gloomy. But that is Frank in 2011, twenty years after the review below that declared Frank's Pizza was the Best of Manhattan in 1991. Yes, twenty years. It's only natural to look exhausted. But I hate to think his long face last night was indicative of how his business is doing.
There was a young couple there on the other side of the room, and me on the other side. I actually liked the pizza, and wouldn't hesitate to buy another one with a diet coke, next time I'm in the area.
There was a young couple there on the other side of the room, and me on the other side. I actually liked the pizza, and wouldn't hesitate to buy another one with a diet coke, next time I'm in the area.
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