current (and recent) events

* diane (wakoski, my goddess with the silver ankle and the zebra) sent me the collected books of jack spicer a few weeks ago. currently working my way through "after lorca", so far loving how spicer marries the magical, the absurd, the humorous, the spectacular, etc etc etc in these "translations". in my goofier moments, i want to emulate this side of spicer.

my large-scale spicer obsession began when, in a contemporary poetry class, diane mentioned that his famous last words were "my vocabulary did this to me" (meaning his early death brought on by severe alcoholism). i then read "imaginary elegies I-IV" in the anthology the new american poetry, a great find at a small used bookshop in east lansing. spicer's musings on the moon, loss, poetry, and god knocked me from my seat. i then bogarted my old roommate's copy of the collected and fell in love with "fifteen false prepositions against god".

having, at least, my own copy has made me feel like a poet again.

side note: when i was pregnant, people were constantly asking me if i played music into my belly for la luz, or read out loud. i went to many poetry readings, concerts, participated in open mics, etc. the few times i purposely sat down and read to la luz in utero, i read the "fifteen", and played johnny cash's cover of "you are my sunshine".

* still working my way through anne carson's decreation. it's rather difficult and dense; i've been making quite a few margin notes, and doing a little light research. reading good, strong poetry (especially a book like carson's with essays and criticism breaking up the poems) brings out the "reader" in me, and the critic. i think, for the first time in quite a while, i'm going to write a paper/article.

this is a good thing. obviously, it is challenging to reconcile my "old" life as a poet/activist/troublemaker with my "new" life. i feel as though i am finally learning to unite them (like spicer's translations, which, as "lorca" calls them, are more centaurs [half lorca, half spicer] than translations.)

* an old colleague of mine (that makes me sound 50!) from the red cedar review (where i worked as poetry editor and reader for a few years while at MSU) emailed me about a month ago. she and two other acquaintances are starting a small press, and approached me with an offer: they want to publish a chapbook of my poems as their fifth "book". (!!!!) i'm ecstatic. i'll have complete control, i'm able to forego the entire submission/contest process, and i'm not "selling out" (as in publishing it myself, or through a vanity press). i am almost unable to believe my "luck" here, in that i was approached by a press, run by editors whose opinion and aesthetics i trust and admire. yipee! it'll be a bit before the book appears, of course; so i'll be keeping everyone posted.

* the weather, and my mood, finally broke. so, i will have some ice cream, a shower, and maybe a short nap, and then sit in the sun.