This fellow Gabriel Gudding Frequently impresses

me and attracts me to his rich, courageous, and hard-working mind. Here he's talking at his blog Earth & Pragmatism about "A Rationale for Writing Poetry with a Kind Mind." And I gotta say, it's like reading some thoughts that I haven't had time to think just yet, but I'm sure they must have been on the backburner. In brief, I find much of what I see Gabe Gudding writing quite compelling and resonant.

Note: Must add his blog link to my Links.

Shoot, goddang fucking straight on, Dude, this is right up my alley:

If the aesthetic is closely federated with the ethical, the practice of verbal and cognitive skills necessarily entails the practice and modeling of dialogic emotional skills such as forthrightnesss, forgiveness, renunciation and lovingkindness. Conceiving the aesthetic as inseparable from ethical questions is especially important for anyone who considers herself a practitioner of "poetry" writing, a genre culturally perceived as all too often marked, since the Modernist moment, by a clear fetish of isolative emotionalism, reactive “expression” of affect, monologic narcissism and aesthetic preciosity, over civically responsive and ethical concerns.

Hey, Gabe, take a look at my Life Sentences. Maybe they're shit to some, but I swear they're aspiring to just exactly these virtues that you are quite rightly encouraging.

Speaking of Otto Rank,

here's a snippett from a web site talking about the great psychoanalyst's great worth,

Anxiety, the "fear of life," Humility, Henry Miller's analyst for a short period, incidentally (and apparently, or according to Henry, anyway, he told the author that he didn't need analysis, that he was already quite healthy -- well, he might have been telling him to fuck off, too, but just as likely, how Miller relates it is, in fact, the truth...), and notions that all humans develop "memories of PERFECTION" and oneness-bliss that they later spend the rest of their lives grieving the loss of (lest they're wise enough to get therapy or otherwise grow up and realize that "perfect parents" is an irrational and childish wish, at least in part, though it may be "an ideal" worth striving to "invent," but that's debatable, too):

Rank finds the myths relatively simple to understand: As children, we worship our parents. But as we get older, they begin to get in our way, and we discover they were not all they seemed. The myth reflects a wish in all of us for a return to the comforting days when we thought our parents were perfect and gave us the attention we felt we deserved. The box or basket symbolizes the womb, and the waters our birth. The "people of low birth" symbolize our weak and unappreciative parents. The king and queen symbolize what they should be like. And the revenge is our anger at how they have mistreated us.

But notice that Rank doesn't bring sexuality into the picture, and doesn't refer to a collective unconscious. The myths are simply the expressions different cultures have given to common childhood experiences. His interpretation may not be perfect, but its humility is refreshing!

Bringing "sexuality into the picture" is, of course, Freud. And the "collective unconscious" is, of course, Jung. Their both bringing "their own stuff" into "the world."

Jacob Russell doing something I myself admire

a great deal but did not do this time around -- canvassing for his candidate for next president, in his case Obama.

Good show, Jacob! This is as impressive and honorable as most writing anybody does. I haven't been able to make that kind of commitment this time around (in 2004 I was quite active, I donated over $3000.00 bucks (on credit cards while stock investments, which eventually went Bust, Ha!, were riding high), and I travelled to Pennsylvania and Ohio to canvass for Kerry/Edwards, as well as canvassing locally for Rochester area pols.

Maybe come Fall my wife and I will do some work for Obama (alas, it looks like he is going to get the nomination, and Hillary, my first choice, won't). (Yeah, I am finally capitulating. All along, I have respected Obama's "TRUER Progessive" orientation more than Hillary's, but I wanted "a woman," and her particularly, as she has been so staunchly and hatefully alientated by this country, and especially here in western New York by the many rednecks who split up these parts of the country, and also because my wife wanted and loves Hillary so much, a feminist loyalty that I of course have great empathy for).

Anyways, though, Congrats on committing time and heart to your canvassing and campaigning. You got my respect, Brother!

Old Buddy Steve Farmer reading at Moe's

in Berkeley, where I purchased all the books I could back when I lived in California. Moe's had a fabulous Used Books section where one could purchase all kinds of great titles at bargain prices, which of course I did as often as I could get down there -- which for a certain period in the late 90's especially was once a week, actually. Well, Friday evenings I would go down there and "do my weekly two hour therapy session" with A.B. over by Ashby, then afterward often I would just hike up into the hills or walk up to Telegraph, and naturally visit Moe's and other bookstores up there, or, often, give Steve Farmer a call and go have a couple of beers with him over in Albany (next to Berkeley).

Anyway, Steve F. is reading with Steve Dickison, whom I also knew back in those days, but even more so back in the 80's when Steve D. worked at Small Press Distribution, down on San Pablo, and used to be really helpful and kind and encouraging when I'd go in there and get some of the first great experimental pomers' books back then.

Here's some of the announcement of the reading at Moe's on April 28th:

Wednesday, April 28: Poets Steven Farmer & Steve Dickison
Steven Farmer's books include Coracle, Tone Ward, World of Shields, Standing Water, Medieval, and a recently completed new manuscript, Autopsia. He's published widely in experimental poetry magazines (recently in Five Fingers Review and the Small Press Traffic Yearbook 2006), and has given readings and participated in discussions at many venues, including University of Pennsylvania's Philly Talks Series, NYU's Poets Talk Forum, and the Poetry Center Archives at San Francisco State University. A UCSD alumnus and San Diego native, he's been a Bay Area transplant since the early 1980s. A former chef, he now works in the IT industry (at Sun Microsystems for the last seven years). One of his sons is staying right up the street from Moe's, a freshman at UC Berkeley.


Steve Dickison is a poet, writer, and editor-publisher of the small press Listening Chamber, Director of the Poetry Center, and lecturer in the Department of Creative Writing at San Francisco State University. Recent writings appear in Civil Disobediences: Poetics and Politics in Action (Coffee House Press, 2004), Recovery of the Public World: Essays on Poetics in Honour of Robin Blaser (Talonbooks, Vancouver, 1999), and in the magazines Both Both, Shiny, Crayon, 26, Shuffle Boil, and Fourteen Hills, where he interviewed Objectivist poet Carl Rakosi. With David Meltzer, he co-edits Shuffle Boil, an occasional music magazine with poet, artist, and musician contributors (www.spdbooks.org). He curated the exhibition Poetry and Its Arts: Bay Area Interactions 1954–2004 at the California Historical Society during Winter 2005, in celebration of the Poetry Center's 50th anniversary, and during Spring 2006 the exhibition Recent Visitors: Poets & Publishing on the Bolinas Scene in the Seventies at the Book Club of California. His most recent book of poetry is Disposed (Post-Apollo Press, 2007).

Well, shoot, I'll add this, too. Steve Farmer I met in 1984, when he was one of the other students enrolled in David Bromige's Poetry from 1923-1925 class at Sonoma State University. That's when I first got to know David Bromige, Barbara Weber, Cydney Chadwick, and Steven Farmer, friendships surely among my very dearest and now going on 25 years...

No, I cannot afford to fly out and attend the Steve Farmer / Steve Dickison reading, though I might have done just that back when I had four credit cards and stock investments 10 years ago... Yep, I'd love to do some of that all over again.

Mentioned by David Bromige in "My Memoir"

in Richard Denner's remarkable Berkeley Daze at Big Bridge.

Dear DB lists me among his lifetime's dearest friends and comrade poets. It doesn't get any better than that, for me. These kinds of "mentions" are ALL I HAVE, it seems, sometimes, and there's something very sad about that, but there's something very good about it, too.

Well, very "sad," I guess, because one is always looking someplace to see if anybody notices one exists etc. Something very good, also, since it reminds one that of course one exists and one's existence is and always has been important to others whose existence obviously matters a great deal to many, many people...

Blah blah blah, it's always about wondering if one is ridiculously lonely or just plain ridiculously naive and deluded thinking everybody else is not just as goddarn ridiculously lonely and needing recognition or acknowledgment or something or another.

Smiles...

Not satisfied with Life Sentences added today,

but for now will add/post them, and perhaps more this evening, anyway. If later I decide that, Yeah, maybe today's addition way too "political," focused on "poetics," and polemical, not to mention simply "maudlin" and sloppy and turgid, then I'll excise what I can't stomach at a later date.

Probably best to let stuff get on the page and NOT self-censor/discard very much until at least a half year or so goes into these things...

Anyway, for anyone interested (and Thank you bro Jim -- 23 years now you encouraged me and been all that I've needed to go on finding/creating trust in myself as a pomer/"poet"/writer), here is a link to today's additions.

More Life Sentences from weekend 3-16 and 17

The Temp woman in Order Processing so shy that she'd become almost a recluse
requiring of herself a certain overexertion in expressing even the simplest
of social needs such that she sometimes came across as spooky abrasive after
and during dealings with intimidators and boors, hence antagonism between her
and the chief hen in Secretarial wielding cramped power that’d have left her
cowering were she not loved and in love. The rusted maroon Toyota with the hard
running engine and the “death trap” soft gas lines underneath threatening to explode
while poor woman renting flat on elegant East Gibson driving to and from
three low income jobs inbetween counties. Clear, straightforward, unprompted
"Hello, Friend" from pal in Quality reminds tech in IT that he's cared for
and considered. CEO visiting woman downstairs minutes after associate supervisor
her senior politely deflects temporal panic following alert that two of his auditors
would be taking cubicles vacated by outsourced programmers she'd hired during
previous month. Tall slender man walking just short of medium height terrier
takes wide swath route around deep red golden retreiver that squats down on
the sidewalk preparing to be friendly, stocky short man a fellow dog owner prejudges
the gesture snobbery before terrier walker ducks into driveway two houses over
with the sign out front reading “Support the Troops, End the War.” Woman dressing
or undressing seen through wide uncurtained window to well-lit second story bedroom
hinging or unhinging black bra strap on bare back man afraid to be taken as peeping
Tom briefly notices before averting his eyes though he’d love to look and the half
clad woman possibly wanting to expose herself to someone just like him. Good doggie
lays down on soft damp spring turf, waits for Master man wearing olive green jacket
who writes for moments in life on pocket blue memo pad. Thinned striped plastic
straw cut to Winston Light 100’s length and used by man his sixth week non-smoking
much less dangerous than actual cigarettes that put him in Emergency Room twice
month of January for pneumonia and chronic bronchitis even if county cops stop him
for routine traffic violation and search vehicle for meth or cocaine. Geese not seen
due to too darkening evening skies nonetheless “felt” to be flying directly overhead
according to honking heard obviously close. Pile of snow five days old covered
by mud, sod, and gravel scooped onto it by plows when pile five times higher.
Flashing red lights of northbound jet miles behind sound of goose heading to Lake
for the night possibly coming from cornfields in Macedon where man and woman
travelled earlier in the day. No theories required to explain sentence writer,
poet, author’s growing contempt for literature dominated by commoditized tracts
and asocial abstraction upper middle class own along with ejaculatory fodder. Pint
of milk’s price jumps a quarter to $1.25 man ashamed of feeling so much disgust
notes in high profit upstate New York Wegman’s grocery store forcing lower
and lower-middle classes to consume high starch high salt high fructose low fiber
low value food stuffs statistically linked to heart disease, diabetes, and cancer
or starve.

---

Four women in Main Inspection for Ron Paul uneasy about Hillary cannot contact
discomfort going against husbands and boyfriends and sons and daughters, hence cross
over the conceptual divide between traditional republicans and priviledged and non-
priviledged progressives alike. Lardy-lard ass kisser recently recruited by Valve
Engineering targeted by pacifist self-described neohippy for violent fantasies
sufficiently and secretly fulfilling after dissing “tree huggers.” Historic
contest between either male and female or black and white compared to game of War
or Crazy Eights with candidates playing race cards, gender cards, wild cards,
jokers, hearts, spades, kings, queens, Selfishness cards, and Humanity cards. Woman
in Quality Department unable to imagine her first ex-husband ever rehabilitated
keeps private memories to herself as co-workers gloat over practical joke focused on
chavinist. Blond haired woman walking small rust-colored pup in park called by her
first name for first time in years after friendly chat about husband visiting “Pat”
down there in Florida and spring fever weather up here in New York with fellow who
accompanied husband’s buddy in 1981 on trip to Boca Raton for pickup of two ounces
of cocaine so popular with some and addictive for others back in those days.
Perfect, gorgeous half inch thick divots taken out of soft damp turf when man
swinging golf club on mid-March afternoon drops right elbow into slot at start of
unrushed downswing. Above freezing temperatures crystalizing densely packed snow
rapidly melting away wide dirty-white piles not expected to line Gibson Street
another two evenings. Couple’s ride out to Walworth to claim small vintage wooden
file cabinet advertized Free on Craig’s List includes surprise spin by
Greystone Golf Course which man in driver’s seat would otherwise visit even though
it’s covered with snow and closed until April. Things noticed in hunt for birthday
gift in TJ Max not entirely unremarkable if untangled by act applying words
to paper and physically amplifying process of observing, woman and man finally
dejected determining they’ll reject attractive large decorative bowl and Italian
made decorative pitcher with similar but not same colorful bric-a-brac designs.
Notion of refering to “Keats’” or Somebody Else’s snobbish, paranoid dictum about
poetry coming as naturally as leaves to a tree categorically rejected like most all
other statements that would begin with “Keats’” or “Pound’s” or “Olson’s” or
“Who Gives A Fuck’s” in order to bolster saleability of sentences and other
sensibilities because Sales not writer’s objective or need. Distain you can take
to the bank laughed or cried lonely, secluded man confident he’d die obscure. Not
so much desire for sex waning as mature interest in less physical “unfinished
business” observed by man who once read atheist or secular humanist Fritz
Perls’ “religiously” and In and Out the Garbage Pail like a bible. Whirr
of traffic objects of cars heard but not seen from rear bedroom on Sunday morning
appearing higher pitched than they do at night to man laying down in bed acutely
aware of difference between daydreams and night dreams. Sound of neighbor scraping
sidewalk while shoveling snow unexpected, then disappointing morning following
previous evening’s rise in temperatures. Geese in the sky obviously gone south to
the lake or north to the cornfields after filling ears with seemingly perpetual
honking for several hours earlier in the morning. Rifle shot unheard of in suburban
neighborhood months after hunting season sounding off silently in mind of non-hunter
laying in bed abusing an ansy imagination. Observations of REAL life
factual details chosen more or less frequently and imaginatively 48 hours straight.
Television’s Discovery Channel become de facto marketing and propaganda
tool for Defense Industry corporations producing weapons they sell to government
using its citizens’ tax monies controlled with shameless shills and antisocial
lobbyists. Barack Obama put in box by Clinton campaign understands man equally
concerned about politics boxing out poet's readers potentially his own competing
poets will likely and aggressively claim for theirs.

For more, read here...

Some more Life Sentences typed in today,

Friday, and right here, Everybody!

This is so funny, doing this all alone and all. Yes, I appreciate the privacy. Proverbial "work" is thus purer and I am making my own mind up about what I want to write, and read, so that is a very good thing, I suspect...

Smiles!

Oh, and a quick little jibe because I like

being "pissy" sometimes:

"The fellow suffered force of Bankruptcy eight months after, at the age of almost 50 and for the first time, marrying and eighteen after the highly speculative stock investments he never in fact cashed out in time had finally TRIPLED following four years of gut-wrenching, fearless and terrifying high risk taking and four dozen margin calls. What part of Misfortune and Devastation don't you conceptualize, Intellect-head?"

And the other one says, "Awww, nevermind! What do you know? You only read yer blasted poetry. You don't actually live it."

Some more Life Sentences

today, Thursday, here, if you're interested...

Hello?

"Monday morning" arranged a few different ways:

Would love it if someone volunteered opinion about how to score this poming:

(1)Block poming, but NOT with margins justified. Very long lines.
(2)Regular "poming" lines that accentuate what "line-breaking" can make.
(3)Justified margins (although I am unable to show that here with blogger).

Maybe I should put these over at AS IS and see if anyone has any opinions or preferences...

Monday morning 1

Monday mourning the weekend enameled to the bedsheets of Sunday afternoon, he be Gee-be great in bed even during the middle ages tho not so much of that mattering anymore. The Director and her Seven Innuendoes, that she may have designed Microsoftt's Internet Explorer even if No she didn't invent the internet. Well of course, why didn't they think of that thot both her two clerks or two techs, after all she "built this network" on lock-and-load, so why not the holes in IT, i.e., they laugh. They would have claimed Firefox, not the most hacked and shlenktit browser on the planet, Claire. Halliburton and Blackwater, Vodka and Agent Orange, take your Quick Pick Ticket to the Wegman's store and trade it for three groceries there, one the red pepper for $2.43, only a nickle when you were just 5 to 10 and sold them to the neighbors straight out of your good father's garden. This the Standard of Living, That the Canard of a Pay Raise, piggy-backed on a study of Larceny from elementary school and up or down, was UP with that, Drake? Down with that, are ya's, Morales? You'll bring in your own coffee, didn't the mafia own the vending machines here in Rochester, or was that 1972 you were so proud of your Italian heritage at age 11 the year before Cognition at 12 and the collective dissonances become all the rage then later in adolescence not so obviously becoming. This is to say, Not to mention the pubic hair you've all been waiting for. Still, nobody says, "Nice concept, Poor design" anymore, and it falls flat but for the form phat and sassy, Sis. One more stare at the ceiling oughta do it. So the Big native american says to the Little native american, "you're lucky you've got a wife and she's lucky she's got one, too." But the Scotch got taped and the soda clouded. Thanks Warren Broach and Machine Corp. for the calendar, this March it's Ocho Rios, Jamaica, and the closest anybody gets to Tropical life around here. "We can dream," shouted one self to the other. "We can even day dream. We just can't execute, all bound up in those morals and ethics the lower middle and lower-lower middle classes get from the prez and the rest of the ridiculously rich, maybe 'cause they've got the stuff in surplus, maybe because they own so much that they can't even give it away, maybe because it's just, as they say, God's little secret." If you were less self-conscious than you were conscious of their selves' bloody consciences, there'd be some kind of hell to pay. The piper, the candlestick maker, the ticket hawkers at old Candlestick and new 3-M, they make tape, too, they sniff glues, they follow clues, they take their cues. The gov'nor gots his twats, his prostitutes, and he's Dem, too, and then he's destitute, no, he's not, but you can't use "twats" here, can you? Kate Mallet carrying a Big Sickle. You gots the trots, now, doncha know, a Miller phrase from the day, his, that is. Lookey-hear, there's the shlmiel: you love others your way, or not, and I love others, you too, my several ways. Deal? H. Miller apologized to her later on, and we'll never know if she showed any real understanding or compassion in return, will we? We will know this -- thousands of humble writers live their lives giving real care to others and we never know that from their writing, about which we always have the last words, don't we, Reader?

---

Monday morning 2

Monday mourning the weekend enameled to the bedsheets of Sunday afternoon,
he be Gee-be great in bed even during the middle ages
tho not so much of that good old matter anymore.
The Director and her Seven Innuendoes,
that she may have designed Microsoft's Internet Explorer
even if No she didn't invent the internet, either.
Well of course, why didn't they think of that
thot both her two clerks or two techs,
for after all she "built this network" on lock-and-load,
so why not the holes in IT, i.e., they laugh.
They would have claimed Firefox not
the most hacked and shlenktit browser on the planet, Claire.

Halliburton and Blackwater, Vodka and Agent Orange,
take your Quick Pick Ticket to the Wegman's Store
and trade it for three groceries there, one the red pepper
for $2.43, JUST a nickle when you were just five-to-ten
and sold them to the neighbors straight out of father's garden.
This the Standard of Living, That the Canard of a Pay Raise,
piggy-backed on a study of Larceny from elementary school
and up or down, was UP with that, Drake? Down with that, are ya's,
Mr. Morales?

You'll bring in your own coffee, didn't the mafia own the vending machines
here in Rochester, or was that 1972 you were so proud of your Italian heritage
at age 11 the year before Cognition at 12 and the collective dissonances
become all the rage then later in adolescence not so obviously
becoming. This is to say, Not to mention the pubic hair
you've all been waiting for. Still, nobody says, "Nice concept, Poor design"
anymore, and it falls flat but for the form phat and sassy, Sis.
One more stare at the ceiling oughta do it.

So the Big native american says to the Little native american,
"you're lucky you've got a wife and she's lucky
she's got one, too." But the Scotch got taped and the soda clouded.
Thanks Warren Broach and Machine Corp for the calendar,
this March it's Ocho Rios, Jamaica,
and the closest anybody gets to Tropical beach life around here.
"We can dream," shouted one self to the other. "We can
even day dream. We just can't execute,
all bound up in those morals and ethics
the lower middle and lower-lower middle classes get
from the prez and the rest of the ridiculously rich,
maybe 'cause they've got the stuff in surplus, maybe
because they own so much that they can't even give it away,
maybe because it's just, as they say, God's little secret."

If you were less self-conscious than you were conscious of their selves'
bloody consciences, there'd be some kind of hay to pell-mell.
The piper, the candlestick maker, the ticket hawkers at old Candlestick
and new 3-M, they make tape, too, they sniff glues, they follow clues,
they takes their cues.

The gov'nor gots his twats, his prostitutes, and he's Dem, too,
and then he's destitute, no, he's not, but you can't use "twats" here,
can you? Kate Mallet carrying a Big Sickle. You gots the trots,
now, doncha know. Lookey, there's the shlmiel: you love
others your way, or not, and I love others, you too,
my several ways. Deal? H. Miller apologized to her later on,
and we'll never know if she showed any real understanding
or compassion in return, will we?

We will know this -- thousands of humble writers
live their lives giving real care to others
and we never know that from their writing,
about which we always have the last words,
don't we, Reader?

---

Monday morning 3

Monday mourning the weekend enameled to the bedsheets of Sunday afternoon, he be Gee-be great in bed even during the middle ages tho not so much of that matter anymore. The Director and her Seven Innuendoes, that she may have designed Microsoftt's Internet Explorer even if No she didn't invent the internet. Well of course, why didn't they think of that thot both her two clerks or two techs, after all she "built this network" on lock-and-load, so why not the holes in IT, i.e., they laugh. They would have claimed Firefox, not the most hacked and shlenktit browser on the planet, Claire. Halliburton and Blackwater, Vodka and Agent Orange, take your Quick Pick Ticket to the Wegman's store and trade it for three groceries there, one the red pepper for $2.43, only a nickle when you were just 5 to 10 and sold them to the neighbors straight out of yer good father's garden. This the Standard of Living, That the Canard of a Pay Raise, piggy-backed on a study of Larceny from elementary school and up or down, was UP with that, Drake? Down with that, are ya's, Morales? You'll bring in your own coffee, didn't the mafia own the vending machines here in Rochester, or was that 1972 you were so proud of your Italian heritage at age 11 the year before Cognition at 12 and the collective dissonance become all the rage then later in adolescence not so obviously becoming. This is to say, Not to mention the pubic hair you've all been waiting for. Still, nobody says, "Nice concept, Poor design" anymore, and it falls flat but for the form phat and sassy, Sis. One more stare at the ceiling oughta do it. So the Big native american says to the Little native american, "you're lucky you've got a wife and she's lucky she's got one, too." But the Scotch got taped and the soda clouded. Thanks Warren Broach and Machine Corp. for the calendar, this March it's Ocho Rios, Jamaica, and the closest anybody gets to Tropical life around here. "We can dream," shouted one self to the other. "We can even day dream. We just can't execute, all bound up in those morals and ethics the lower middle and lower-lower middle classes get from the prez and the rest of the ridiculously rich, maybe 'cause they've got the stuff in surplus, maybe because they own so much that they can't even give it away, maybe because it's just, as they say, God's little secret." If you were less self-conscious than you were conscious of their selves' bloody consciences, there'd be some kind of hell to pay. The piper, the candlestick maker, the ticket hawkers at old Candlestick and new 3-M, they make tape, too, they sniff glues, they follow clues, they take their cues. The gov'nor gots his twats, his prostitutes, and he's Dem, too, and then he's destitute, no, he's not, but you can't use "twats" here, can you? Kate Mallet carrying a Big Sickle. You gots the trots, now, doncha know, a Miller phrase from the day, his, that is. Lookey-hear, there's the shlmiel: you love others your way, or not, and I love others, you too, my several ways. Deal? H. Miller apologized to her later on, and we'll never know if she showed any real understanding or compassion in return, will we? We will know this -- thousands of humble writers live their lives giving real care to others and we never know that from their writing, about which we always have the last words, don't we, Reader?

More Life Sentences, for anything it's worth to ya's:

here, for now, and then here later with more not yet typed today.

Some new Life Sentences added today

here, if anybody wants to see what I'm doing...

Ummm, yes, I am having a bit of difficulty getting these things arranged on the page in Blogger. And then when I started trying to shift things around so that the lines balance, well, it's a hassle, but eventually I'll get all these babies to line up smooth.

Possibly I should just use blockquote tool and score the lines in Word and then just transfer them into blockquote on blogger...

Tao (or Dao) means "Way" or "Path"

Binary Morales, hardly a sustainable balance, DOW not Dao way with us, 0's and 1's, must I be so solitary in my circle jerk charms. That's just -- no, not "just," substitute only -- One way a number 1 grandson Might someday, were he a real man -- no, substitute "fellow," fallow conscience. Hardly an art form, his. Hiss. Boy's "a pussy" if ever there was 1. But don't use that word, so beautiful and sensuous otherwise. "That's JUST yr opinion." Substitute "pissant" or "prick." No, not that, neither! Such a good word if solely sensual, sexual. Substitute! Substitute, substitute, substitute. Sooner or later, Above is gonna let ya insert som'thin' corny and cheap and pedestrian. Sooner or later, you're going to believe Binary Morales and assorted others, sordid brothers, ARE 1's and you're Zero, Zano... Stab 'em in the face. They'll never see it coming, scratching each other's backs, kissing each other's Boss Boots in Finger Lake. Indigenous Summer.

Go HILLARY! Big comeback victories last night!

Yeah, I'm for HILLARY, very much so

(though, Yes, I love Obama, too),

but I want A WOMAN, Period.

And I am enamored of Hillary Clinton, particularly because she has been the object of such blatant, ugly misogyny for two decades now.

And I live in western New York -- and I work with, put up with, mostly silently and humiliatingly, Hillary-haters that would make New York City liberals and progressives' stomachs turn like crazy. But this is western New York -- a completely different, and quite alien, planet (sometimes, p-e-r-h-a-p-s). I never realized it, or knew it, back when I lived in California most of my life. I somehow just figured that all of New York, and certainly western New York (where I grew up, where I was raised) was quite extensively "liberal," and maybe it is compared to other parts of the country... But a lot of it certainly isn't (or at least here in the factory where I work, or at least here in my head while I work in the factory here). A lot of western New York is passive AND aggressive Republican country. (Or only slightly "Republican," but it's still been so very disconcerting these past 8 years. Has it perhaps been strange EVERYPLACE in the country, and around the world, since 9/11, and then since Bush, and then since the Iraq invasion, and then since the whole world-politic got so incredibly mixed up and insane?)

Anyway, though, of course it's mostly the feminist thing, the belief in and desire for A TRULY DEEP CHANGE in "the collective (Un)conscious/ness" that I'm looking for, and that Change would come by having a Woman as president. It would come in many, many subtle ways, I believe. It would just happen. I am, of course, very stubborn in my beliefs about "the male order" being the problem with the world. I am perhaps fanatic and delusional in believing that everything from War and Militarism and Eco-rape is caused by imbalance in the human consciousness that favors and priviledged all that is male and not enough of what is female (particularly, more social emphasis, less "ego," less the "individualism" emphasis). But that's where I'm at and will continue to be. (And I will allow that my own self-described uber-feminism may also be a defense against or masking of sexism and stupidity that I myself haven't fully worked through... Who knows...)

Now, it IS true that I dissed Hillary as "Republican-lite" sometimes vehemently back in the Years of Horror (2002-2004, when the hysteria took over and the country went into Iraq and followed Bush and Co. to the doors of Hell). I called a lot of folks "Republic-lite" back then, including Kerry when he started to beat Dean). I was so terribly angry, enraged, paranoid, upset, desperate, frantic for so many years, and as soon as I saw this factory where I work go berserk with instant and fanatic revenge desires the very day that the 9/11 horrors took place -- we in the MIS Dept. were instantly ordered to get the TV coverage up on the mid-company cafeteria PowerPoint system, and immediately, I thought to myself, with secret and great shame, "Jeesus, now Bush is going to go into Iraq or someplace and bomb the hell of them, and these people (my co-workers) will cheer every minute of it, and I just knew what was going to happen, and I went crazy inside, knowing this was "the perfect storm" for the kinds of insanity that a deeply corrupt, insanely immoral administration like Cheney/Bush might unleash. My god, the minute the hardcore republicans at this company saw the attack on the towers on the TV, they were absolutely ready to drop a nuke on the whole middle east, as simple as that, no questions asked at all, no second thoughts whatsoever. I cringed inside, instinctively I knew that Cheney/Bush were completely capable of fomenting unspeakable global horrors, at the very least "bombing" civilians, maybe not with nukes, but with regular weapons of horrible destruction and they'd justify and the people here would go along with it, and who would get hurt the most? The civilians, the powerless... Automatic...


Any I still deep down believe that Obama has surely been the true "progressive," and the one who really "did the right thing." But damn it, this is the first time, and it may be the last time for many years, that there is a chance for a good woman, and an honorable "liberal," and certainly a feminist and a humanist, to be the president of our outrageously powerful force/control in the world, something for which our society's "responsibility" is absolutely enormous. And if we could get a woman into the presidency, then I think that will change everything. And then follow it up with "the first black male," good, fine, after she, Hillary, has had 4-8 years to reverse the horrible course that Bush and Cheney put the planet on.

Anyway, that is my wish, and my wife's, too, and I know that she knows much better than I what being a woman means...

Richard Denner at Big Bridge with great new work

Check out Richard's "Berkeley Daze" project at Big Bridge:

Denner writes:

The idea for these "profiles" began with Michael Rothenberg asking me to do
a feature for Big Bridge on the Berkeley street poets, and I started writing on the ones I knew who climbed up on the window ledges of California Hall on
UC campus to eavesdrop on the 1965 Berkeley Poetry Conference. Paul X and I
climbed up at random and found ourselves outside Robert Creeley's
workshop -there were a number of these workshops going on each day for two
weeks and it was warm and the windows were open, and Creeley was saying,
"There is a war; there is not a war," and Duncan said, "Why don't you let
those guys come in," and Creeley said, "Sure, why not?" and we hopped in,
sat ourselves down and joined the I.W.W. of Poetry. (excerpt from my preface
to "Berkeley Daze").

I think I wrote a poem today:

Been writing mostly prose lately, but here's something that might be called poming, heck if I know anymore...

Post Maiden

A fellow's homely ride transports him and his bride
along dotted lines marked by glowing, radiating pink
snow. The moon that borders the wet skyline along
the east hillside imposes a rich honey colored reflection
on an otherwise typically silver sparkling pond where
the man and his valentine would have skinny dipped
once in the previous dry summer. A more romantic
vehicle, perhaps, the vintage 1958 Chevy Impala convertible,
had been offered by the groom's brother-in-law, but
they chose the old Ford van, despite the unattractive
and unsightly rust spots, some soon to develop into gaping
holes, for they could camp in the van and forego
hotel expenses half the nights, thereby afford two weeks
vacation instead of just one, and any time that they wanted
to pull over and draw the shades and make out and go
wherever that stuff led to, they could, they conspired.
Nobody in his right mind and Nobody in her right mind
bothered young lovers and kids kissing in cars
and pickups and tree houses and back porch verandas
back then back when everybody would soon go back
to school for their Senior and final years, in some cases
pregnant, trapped, frantic, naive, patient, understanding,
be as it may. What year was it, on the other calendar,
the calendar with other days and months and indications
of Decade, sometimes seasons we all pass through,
according to Hoyle or according to the Home Economics
instructors just then becoming fashionable in the small
rural schools. Why not summer of your discontent or
civilization and its two seasons Fall and Autumn, why does
everything have to be so precise and enormous? This mattered
naught to the two newlywed bank clerks. They kept banker's
hours and snuck away at noon most work days for play
lirks just around most every corner the carefree care
to look after and preserve. They preserved it everywhere
they could, even in accounts going forward and accounts
receiveable, but especially down at the park in the middle
of the town at the edge of the river by the wheat field so very
golden and gentle from the first of July to the edge of August.

Some small additions added to Life Sentences today:

Case anybody's interested, these Life Sentences are main thing I'll be writing here, posting here for the immediate future and the year...

The root of all idiocy?

"Money, not ideology, drives some Iraqi fighters."

Well, of course, were we to put the 1.5 trillion and the energy of so many lives into education and not militarism, then maybe ideology would be replaced by Understanding, but then the defense contractors would be out of work and the stock markets would crash, blah blah...

More "collateral damage" from religion.

"I am so very sorry for the collateral damage it's caused
our family and the families hurt by the removing of the veil
that hid our humanity and our sinfulness," said D.E. Paulk,
who received the mantle of head pastor a year and a half ago.

Religious "leader" and his "collateral damage"
"telling her it was her only path to salvation."

Woke up this morning thinking of Jacob Russell and

thinking of the things he writes about, especially difference between formalism and realism; difference between writing for other writers and writing for new readers who may never be other writers OR readers ("mainstream," "popular society," "commodity culture," "publishers," and the like); naming, if only partially, the unnameable; and much other thot/thought that I find particularly resonant and "real."

Should perhaps turn on my "Comments" component, though/tho (if I use "tho," will I gain readers New American Projectivist sympathetic? if I use "thot," will I gain Lang-po sympathetic readers? if I use "pomers" instead of "poets," will I endlessly regain myself (big fucking deal!)? Ha! it's such a game when one feels "wicked" or mischievous or "cynical," and it's "fun," but does one want to "feel cynical" -- No, that's particularly suspect; does one want to have "fun" -- sometimes, but not all the time, certainly; is it just a "game" and getting into "wicked mode" purchases a ticket to the ballpark Ron and Charles and Ruth and Gertie and one's fantasies built -- yeah, too often, metheenks, duh-dud, in this pomer's nauseating fantasies, anyway; is it just a matter of "marketing" -- yeah, it probably is, in which case, maybe best to learn to play, and play hard, but what if "work" is then soft?), but the last time I turned on my Comments component, I got a whole bunch of spam and I don't mean unflattering (or excessively flattering) feedback from other pomers; I mean actual run-of-the-mill spam. Well, okay, there's the filtering feature and one can monitor and select Comments, so maybe I should try it out with that thing enabled. Or not, maybe let all, if any, Comments get posted. I don't know, should move on. Whoops, sorry about that, just f/punning.

The Real... Real "art" or "real world?" Real question or real art concern? Real agency or real publishing agency? Ha... Real life or really good life? Real writing or real fetish. The list can go on ad infinitum, I guess, but damn, Friend, sure nice to read your blog, JRBD, and get the nourishment it gives. Yeah.

Yeah, all about "marketing" and then prior to that "making it marketable" (or NEWly marketable), and then prior to that, figuring out what "it" to make in the first place, and then before that, well, that's one track of mind to mind, mine...

If I read you accurately enough, not simply reading myself into your notes, there is some particular, yeah, fetish of form, clamor for form, etc., which eventually disturbs one (demoralizes one, too). "Make it new!" Okay, fine, but make what new? Well, "not this," of course, yeah... (We're all just "players on a stage..." Why did that notion come to mind just now?)
We're all in for a wicked fall, third to last season of man? If so, "should" one just have fun, including status/"success" at writing, including creating new forms, including getting attention -- how about ensuring that there is a new series of seasons, a happy New Year, year of the Human, year of Woman, year of Life on the planet, year of the planet? Global warming just marking the end of time of man? "Mother Nature" taking over? Guess who can't stop the puns...

---

Read Pinker (The Language Instinct) when it came out back then. Was much intrigued and recall both deep agreement and deep disagreement with a lot of his theorizing, but can't recall particulars of what I liked/disliked... Darn... Maybe down the line... These notes woefully inadequate, Jacob. More later, hopefully, but for now have to get to other writing needs (and other Sunday obligations, family stuff, etc.).

Jacob Russell, Warm Regards!

Was perusing Jonathan Mayhew's blog today and reading some comments and then looking up comments' posters' profiles I wanted to learn more about. Discovered Jacob Russell and checked out his blog Barking Dog, immediately attracting me with posts referencing equally intriguing writer "Fadi Abou-Rihan on The Psychoanalytic Field in his running commentary on Anti-Oedipus." Nice discovery of two fine writers and of course adding them to my Others links list. Much thrilled also to read further and see that Jacob had come across Black Spring. His comments encourage me, and it's of course great cheer seeing a fellow traveler in the blogosphere, in cyberspace, happening upon my scribbling and taking the time to acknowledge it. (Heaven knows that when "strangers" out there have read yer blog/writing and like some things you've written, that means the things connect on their own, so that's especially thrilling to me, to be sure.)

Thank you for your warm comments, Jacob! Always abundantly sustaining, to me.

What to do this morning, How to go about it...

Been up for an hour or so this morning. Want to write. Not finding easy inspiration. Reading msnbc.com, particularly the Politics section I peruse fairly obsessively. Well, daily several times, actually, so it's a bit of an addiction and probably a waste of a lot of time, but the obsession isn't going to go away any time soon -- the world, or that world, is such a mess and I cannot, will not, turn my eyes from it. I'm not going to try obliterating the obsession, I guess...

THAT world... No more and no less real than others one could construct for oneself, attend to. It is probably true that devoting, or giving, so much attention to THAT world greatly diminishes engagement in much more meaningful and enriching existence/living. Easy to disparage "addiction" to it. Monstrously depressing to consider excising it from one's life, yeah, cutting it right out of one's most pressing concerns, and, further, devoting oneself to less selfless "meaninglessness." Will continue accepting the "addiction," letting the ravaging world, THAT world, consume me, for now...

Do not relish the thought of trying to compose some "Life sentences" today while THAT world will dominate and reduce the poming I've started recently to that attention. Will let some of it "impinge," probably, but want to limit the degree to which it will invade, corrupt, what else might get discovered, if possible, particularly by getting outdoors, walking, just through town would do...

S.R.'s REAL is my emerging guideline at present. Much of what I've gotten going thus far is a million miles from Stephen Ratcliffe's very genuine achievement and (god I hate this fucking word -- aren't there others I could use) "work." But I am completely enamored of this book the good Bolinas master sent me some months ago, and I am definitely attempting to bring some of what I love in it to my own efforts to make some meaning that I might value tomorrow, not just at the moment that I am composing (and then, Poof, it's gone!). Will also post review of REAL that I began last week very soon. Just have to type it up, and then I can post it here and keep working on, too.

The notion of getting outside, actually physically getting outdoors, and moving the body, changing the mind's eye, breathing more, getting the heart pumping more, moving, moving, did I say moving, getting away from "the poetry of the computer in one's head, the poetry of the books in one's head, the poetry of the habituations of process and form and style in one's head," or just getting away from everything already in one's head is sometimes, for me, best accomplished by getting outside, maybe getting into a car and traveling, or walking, getting out there. "In here" is going to come along anyway for the ride anyway, but the "out there" out there refreshens the "in here," and ohhh, doesn't this sound like such groovy, groovy, groovy, self-conscious poetics type talk, which is to say, the "in here" vomit that the EPC and Mr. Silliman and these poetry blogs, though altogether indispensable, have so eloquently and ingeniously elevated to art forms of their own right, and that I have so consciously as well as defenselessly trained myself to imitate, obsess about, enjoy, and love?
Yet I want to call it vomit, too... Well, it's not vomit -- I mean, my own may be vomit, and surely is, a lot of the time, this very moment perhaps an instance -- but I have got to digest, redigest, and continue to redigest the whole habituated process of focusing on such stuff, and I am absolutely certain that much REAL writing like Stephen R.'s does not come into being by sitting in one's head in a room and obsessing about real writing... Or something... Or by reading msnbc.com politics pages. Or something...

Thanks, Richard Lopez!

California brother who has helped me keep my spirit up this last year or so, Richard Lopez, in Sacramento. Something of an angel, Richard. You're solid, Richard, like a really good golf shot with a four iron from 183 out caught flush and straight for the pin. Yeah...

White House violations

White House ordered to save copies of e-mails.

Groups say millions of online documents destroyed — a federal law violation.

Nick Piombino with Gregory Vincent St. Thomasino

at The Argotist Online talking about Creativity and Truth. Good stuff.

Notes: Gregory writes, "I get the feeling creativity—as a term, as an idea, as a topic for discussion—has gone the way of “poetic inspiration” in that not only has it lost currency, it is, methinks, become the stuff of myth. (By “creativity,” I mean specifically artistic and intellectual inventiveness and purposiveness, and not, say, run-of-the-mill problem solving.)"

Yes, "poetic inspiration" I think too became a cliche, a way of promoting one's "creative 'work'" by attributing the skill and quality to others, muses and precursors and seldom simply loneliness or dejection or anguish or good fortune, others already acclaimed and accepted and celebrated. Also, "self-effacement" and humility -- "oh, I didn't write that poetry; my muses did." Perhaps self-effacement and humility genuinely felt and observed and desiring to be expressed but in varying degrees somewhat disingenuous nonetheless. Add one: how does Jack Spicer's claim that "it" came in via the radio or the air waves fit here? Am I being mean if I suggest that to some degree this too was disingenuous? I apology in advance for certain irreverence I am sometimes far too easily inclined to indulge in (I'm tired of it, in myself, to be honest). I am, however, still suspicious of the whole gesture and expressions like "it came in." I don't buy these kinds of expressions anymore, even as I am certainly going to discover myself inadvertently employing some variation of them sometime, someday, in the future, I'm sure (as they're deeply embedded in the whole architecture of self-promotion and gaining attention/recognition, as well as getting it), though of course, I may have to wait until I write something that others find worthy, first.

Gregory writes, "And as for 'the new' I’ll tell you that however welcome it may be, the coming of it is not 'conscious' or 'deliberate,' and I wonder if this is not the stuff of 'poetic inspiration.'" Perhaps not -- "conscious or deliberate," that is. I think of Shakespeare, though, and I imagine someone quite conscious and quite deliberate much of the time. Well, now, maybe the actual particulars, the incredible quantity and quality of puns working on so many different levels and absolutely packing his lines, yeah, those must have come, to some degree, less consciously and deliberately, but he seems to have been very much "in control" of what he was doing and trying to do much of the time, just so phenomenally talented that he could just turn on the pun and story machine and everything he put down on paper was genius.

Nick writes, "creativity arises as a compensatory function," goes on to say that the "ivity" serves to protects "idealized parents" needed. The child and the parent, at once two "separate" objects, one with enormous power over the other and a much more developed or fixed sense of Self/person, the other quite dependent on the parent and only beginning to develop sense of Self/person, discriminate between out there and other and in here, what is for now particularly amorphous. What would the child be "compensating" for, exactly, though? Perhaps realization that the parent IS an other, thus NOT perfectly at one with the child's own impulses now perceived as coming from within and being increasingly separate from the parent's response to them? Are you saying that Creativity is mental processing to substitute for, "compensate" for, realization that parent is no longer there, at one with the child, omnipotent, the child is no longer omnipotent and the parent is now idealized in order to retain some of that omnipotence that appears to be disappearing. Hence, the child begins to "create" and thus create his/her own Self, sense of self? I'm not sure why this is "compensatory."

Well, okay, the paragraph that begins with "The imagination is the engine of the process of constructing internal object representation" answers my question about why this is "compensatory." Are we in adulthood still responding to denial of things urgently needed, and thus we "create" in order to bridge the sometimes harrowing discrepancy between what we want and/or expect and what is available and/or returned from the world, which is full of countless idealized others/parents. Do we create in order to process the difference between what we want/need and what reality offers, seems also to want/need, possibly cannot possibly provide, though "reality"/the WORLD IS, and still must always remain, at least in part, "idealized" (elsewise we would lose "hope," lose our sense that Reality was also something that we ourselves in part created/made and/or had some control over and/or were a part of -- this is why WAR among other things causes a lot of so much distress; it simply is not and never will be "sane" to us and putting up with it feels like losing our sense of Reality). Do most poets/artists "create" because (1)they identify with, and form their own identities from, other poets (idealized parents) that have gone before them, so in order to maintain, or gain, their identities, they are compelled to make things (poems) that will include them among their precursor identities; and (2)they must construct perceptions of the world that match, at least in part, what their on-going indentities, including identification with idealized others and a tradition of "sanity" and "beauty" and "truth," need to stay sane and exist with reasonable self-esteem and such things as "hope" and "happiness?"

That's all I can do for now. Must get to bed and sleep before working tomorrow. Wish I could keep going; it's so much genuine pleasure. Maybe can return to it another day. We'll see... Either way, good stuff, Nick and Gregory! "Inspiring," Ha, too!

Stephen Ellis has a blog.

This is fabulous good news. Allen Bramhall reported it today. Stephen Ellis has started a blog.

Why are we at war with ourselves?

Why are we at war with ourselves?

Posing the question is counter-productive, futile, a waste of time. Instead of asking such question, one should start with the reality or fact that it implies, in this case, the obvious, "we are at war with ourselves and it sucks." And it sucks... Yeah, I know. That's not particularly elegant, but elegance here may be, again, a waste of time. Keep going: we are at war with ourselves, it sucks, and we don't want to be at war with ourselves.

What can we do about this reality that we do not want? We've been at war with ourselves off and on throughout history, whether internally, within our own psyches, or culturally, between cultures and nations. Obviously, something in our nature demands war now and then and we submit to the insane demand. Some of us submit to the demand. Obviously, not all of us submit to the demand all of the time, and some of us never submit to the demand. Thoreau, Gandhi, Martin Luther King never submitted to the demand to go to war. Obviously, Riane Eisler and countless women throughout history have not submitted to the demand to go to war and obviously patriarchy is more responsible for making the demand to go to war than matriarchy.

Obviously, most humans do not want to go to war, do not want to submit to the demand to go to war. Who makes the demand and how can we resist it, stop those "animals" from making it, and preserve our dignity and liberty in the face of their intolerable demands? (I know. These are ridiculously simple questions, and they've been asked elegantly and earnestly for eons. They've been answered elegantly and intelligently for eons, also. We continue to submit to the demand to go to war. Some of us do...)

I'm going back to bed for a bit, perhaps think and write about this "problem" there.
It's chilly here in the back porch computer room my wife and I constructed, and I am of course tired, as it's 5 in the morning.

11-9-07 -- 05-11-08 Life Sentences

Waves shape fit man similar each spin and turn never quite the same
except exhilarating the way 347 dimple sphere shares air
sashays as shape and sense alike mindful of sound
syntax purpose purely kinesthetic. Man nauseated by thought
of always trying to be like someone else instead of himself,
in fact a man always like someone else, not nobody at all.
Did he always like someone else more than himself
or did he simply want someone else to like him in return.
"Nobody new" is a cheap pun and no longer fun. Everyone
is like someone else is so true that it's truly meaningless.
He wasn't truly trying to be like someone else.
And he knew he already was himself, so he didn't have to try
to be himself. There was nothing wrong with wanting to be
like someone else. What was nauseating was the fact that as soon as he tried
to be like someone else, or almost as soon as that, he became bored
and feltdisgusted with himself. Was it he, himself, he found nauseating,
or was it someone else. He felt compelled to ask why he felt compelled
to try and be like someone else, which was ridiculous.
Truth, or subjectivity, almost impossible to come by
with any consistent objectivity, nonetheless cannot be purchased
by the poor from the rich, who claim it as an entitlement
though they seldom truly own it. The two hundred pound stepson
wanted a ride to the store to get a soft drink at 11:00 p.m.,
the one hundred sixty pound stepfather wanted to go to bed
to get a hard night's sleep, and the one hundred twenty pound mother
weighed in at 110, actually. If I really get rolling, this writing
will soon deteriorate into jokes about O'Reilly, Savage,
and Limburger, not laughing matters anymore. The bluster
of Trying, trying too hard, knot words themselves
but rigid syntax plying imploded tension to attention frozen
in obsolescent spontaneity, the dark side of time, or space
misperceived as the nothingness defining limit. Often
they didn't want to hear him, "Listen to me, please! Please
listen to me!" And they got "bored," or they felt "insulted"
immediately, but what did they want to shut up if not their own insight
embedded in the point they so urgently prevented him
from making a bridge to. Were I able to make all of this abstraction
palpable, concrete, I'd have a few lines of poetry, albeit small
case, but it'd make perfect sense.

---

An older woman of eastern European or middle-eastern descent
hunched in the corner of apparently strife-ravaged dark housing
unit with the front street entrance open to the narrow alleyway,
her deep brown eyes cast slightly down just past level
and reviewing anguish and loss or helplessness, this in dark
grey and brown toned dream while snug and warm within clean
purple bed sheets, paisley blueberry and green stemmed thick cotton
quilt comforter, and Persian-style embroidered rich brown
and maroon bed cover. The man who would sooner ride the wave
than rate it declining to define himself as a surfer.
The snag in the writing effort that occurs before or after perusing
online encyclopedia entries describing Gandhi, his principles,
his achievements, his sacrifices, love, compassion, justice,
religion, courage, celibacy, cowardice, non-violence. Ocean
of protocols, ANSI standards, Open Systems Information layers,
and countless other terms drowning competent computer tech's
impulse to attempt career change or advancement in suffocating
sea of ambivalence. Satisfaction paying three hundred dollars
toward four hundred dollar NYSEG heating bill one month past due
last week this afternoon. The various and the sundry tones
of whites including light and bright whites stretching
through window shades. The hum of the fan in the bathroom
or the one on the computer counters in the back porch
using additional electricity and probably not needing to be on
there, much less in Northern California, where internal temperature
control and external odor dissipation were not major issues.
The Avenue B / O Books title Talking in Tranquility sitting
on the second shelf of the bedside bookshelf between Behave
and My Poetry apparently having ended up in that location
by purely chance procedures of book shelf reshuffling
from the last time it was opened for an hour or so.
The stepson voluntarily walks the dog or the stepson voluntarily
walking the dog or the tail wags the dog or the dog
poet wags his tongue or the dog poming wagging the dog
pomer and his doggone drivel. Sometime in his 30's or 40's
Gandhi discarded another habit he didn't want and ceased
reading the newspaper, particularly the World News sections
no less oppressive than the msnbc.com and cnn.com windows
to the world available today. The green ideas and blue ideas
hoping to subdue the old black and white ideas, release
the new brown and grey ones long overdue. The man whose
father was killed when the man was very young understanding
or not understanding the love the other son had for his kind
father living a long life. The notion of self-determination
in a world of other-determined notions surviving both self
and world. Once in a blue moon on the green fairways
the fellow took some pleasure tallying his score even though
it could spoil the proverbial walk and the sublime interruptions.

---

Tasteless invective of strangely familiar peer’s hallobaloo
out of step in time for late lunch on low income. Road Closed
sign either side of dual traffic barriers midway between
town park thru-street restricting passage to protect parents
and children where the playground begins and the tennis courts end.
Bangs Hill bump in the descending elevation awaiting sleds and tobaggons
middle of November before snow supplies skies and land alike with white
redundant fun. Leaves remaining on many trees showing off full autumn
color schemes’ multi-shades of burnt orange and yellow-green
or refusing to leave respective nests. Big kids, little kids,
in-between kids on vacation day from school, then one pummeling another
pinned to the ground and helpless, minutes going by like decades
until observer realizes nothing has changed since he himself a victim
of the same humiliation at the hands of the same kind,
possibly his own bullies’ kin. Olive-skinned man with nothing he can do
to get back to sleep on November morning learning to imitate
REAL good writing with compassion that might become his life or art.
Fan in the back room humming between cacophanous lung expulsions
of cigarette smoker not willing to quit until his wife can,
calling the pact of c-sticks Love, fearing to write the c-word,
cowardice perhaps courage perhaps guilt maybe rebellion maybe.
Poor woman whose parents have passed evicted from apartment
in Auburn while son moves to sunny Florida with fifty grand stash
from father in prison two decades after mother divorces him.
Life sentences nobody in his right mind would want
to write about written by man anyway though he knew
there might be much more sorrow and he would do everything he could
to quell it. Memory of immature thought that puns and their fun
open mind, herds of words stampeding earth and world into
senseless import, homonyms of the strange, all of a moment dear
in hard, harsh head lines of a so-called "New."

---

Man on television news program taking cues from senior executives
directed by broadcasting network mogul to protect presidential
candidate vying for highest democratic office electorate entrusts. Purse
hung from strap on hook looks like good choice for string of mono-
syllabic words. Irony found in nearly every observation of objects
planted in plot constructed by plodding self-reflexive thought
manufacturer, an overdetermined world changed for better or for worse
by prearranged marriage to language strained by thick ambition.
Where three planes intersect, three corners two-dimensional
or one corner three-dimensional, none connected to curmudgeon
Marcuse the man’s therapist had at Brandeis or Many Dimensional
Man’s James Olgilvy whom the man read in his own years before and after
graduating from dumb party school where scholar older classmate later Doctor
John A. created mid-70’s solar panels, encouraged reading
The Electric Kool-aid Acid Test before heading for his Stanford.
The young man who had avoided steroids perceiving a wall
against his back, the wall in fact in front of him, blocking view
of his mother which neither he nor she could see clear through
it seemed to the older man who was her husband and the young
man’s step-father or friend. Mishearing the manager’s late day
directives to assist woman in Inspection Department access user
account on Xerox Scanner disingenuously interpreted as defiance
of orders, used as millionth opportunity to demean subordinate
or display caricature of control. The man who never
in thirty-nine years felt lonely while hitting golf balls in the park
finally realizing that he could derive the same infinite pleasure writing
life sentences, some perfectly pure and astonishingly
fulfilling, some “duffed and dooked and sklenklit,” and none ever
bothersomely boring for himself. Approximately one hundred twenty-three
to one hundred thirty-eight steps between point-of-contact
with Taylor Made OS RAC nine iron and ball said to be rested
after 130 yard well struck golf shot from bottom right corner
to top left corner framing large symmetrical imaginary green. The walks
in between long swing and swats and chops and swooshes
six never entirely identical per set as pleasant as it gets
in an existence with everything and nothing mattering equally. There
in the park, that very same park where he first traveled away from home
a half mile away for the first time at age 6 and became elated
before or after he exclaimed that he "had a blast" and saw his mother’s
face beaming with the deepest joy imprinted in his memory forever.
There in the park, that very same park where he and his dad age 78
could still swing their clubs like they’d been born and died in heaven.
There in the park, the other boy who was then the first boy’s best friend
said he’d tried smoking and the first boy, privately aghast at
this taboo act, nevertheless indebting himself to the hacking habit
four decades later. The natural golf swing and the natural sentence were one
and the same, everybody possessing one and even the pros knew it.
The old man who could have processed shame honorably never did
permit the managers, numbering fewer than a handful of bullies and
cowards amongst their ranks, feedback from their subordinates, who
suffered bogus yearly reviews neither reflecting their effectiveness
nor encouraging honest effort, all the good company operating
by 19^th Century authoritarian order, owner a billionaire and others
classed as his workers. Leaves late to the party Indian summer
before ‘08 turning color and on the run from Exxon warming trends.

---

The man in the adjacent office sobbing quietly following the beating
he’d given to his therapist’s heavy pillow substituted for precursors
who focused so extensively on Poetics that the man began to believe
they were threatening his life, perhaps even the planet’s, and surely
each, every life of letters. Thick yellow paint marking the two otherwise arbitrary
walkway entrances to factory providing choices for physically and
emotionally handicapped, disabled, and challenged employees.
Predisposition picking persons as objects of observation possibly social,
asocial, or both, probably more introspective than extroverted, in any case
obsessive, thus suspect, perhaps subject to change, such subjectivity itself
often Agency misappropriated. Megalomaniac frumpy fantasies of frustrated
company factoid frequenting a freedom to record chronic discord felt at solenoid
factory fortunately checked regularly by mature fear of reprisal or wisdom
of common senses. The old man who would have been named Drake Morales
in a novel that could have been titled Cubicle-22 ascending to his office
on the second floor from the elevator on the first. The other IT Department
computer technician taking a day off from his job which paid 30,000 bucks
per year in 2007. The fellow in the Engineering Lab decorating his secluded back
room work space walls with pictures of his heroes Ronald Reagan, John Wayne,
George Bush the Junior, and Uncle Sam. The man wise to the supervisor’s semi-
consciously designed other-fulfilling prophesies feeling helpless to refuse
the damage that she did, salvage an otherwise reasonably safe work environment.
The little man himself yet again flustered by fact that he had to say Hello
in passing to that secretly marxist employee whose name he refused to learn.

---

The two women certainly nurses at the hospital next door to the factory
thanking the man for wishing them a safe drive home after their shifts,
reminding them to watch out for the astounding numbers of late fall deer
this season the price of gas had increased to three-fifty a gallon.
The fellow prone to pronouncing grandiose, pretentious fodder
opining sappy, sophomoric distinction between painters and poets,
the former preserving space for starving artists, the latter reserving
tastes from inherited Harvard fathers. The four men on break
with their short hair obviously coiffed, left right front and center
all ‘round the one who privately shuns barbers, dissing restrictions
on gas drilling in Alaska and denouncing tree huggers' love of their forests,
not the longer haired fellow himself, whom each liked personally
and readily accepted at their 3 p.m. table, discussing the news
all four privvy to, a hundred and another hundred plus seventy mil
to the baseball player for ten years play. The malleability of network
cable such that the kinks should remain, to a point not exceeding
three hundred feet link to link. The woman whose oldest sister
could have doubled for Cybil Shepard back in 1973 loosening her smart guard
around the man who matriculated at the same time and knows how
inferior boys were then when both girls got abused by his peers.
Navy blue shirts and dungaree jeans that mark the outsource crew
in Quality erecting new cubicles 12-20 forming minute distraction late Friday.
Two smokers in the gazebo over at the hospital with half the third smoker’s
education between them never take any guff from the woman named You-know-who,
shocking the thought that either should ever lose a job
the third smoker imagines to himself, bewildered that he cannot affect
the same brash, brazen defiance at his own workplace.

---

At best flashes and even then curiously sterile, the least mystical
instances of bygone gigs recurring almost daily and inexplicably
unanticipated in the concentration lapses more and more irritating
the tall, large framed Senior Inspector in the Q Dept., the man
who sidelined as band leader for blue grass group once boasting
almost regional following spanning six counties, the music now growing
more faint with each passing accretion of years and what remaining
of it in the porous memories snickering sour notes mercilessly imprecise.
The hour after hours at Toot's Tavern down town's hill road to some
limbo between the Hades of vocation and a purgatory of infidelity.
The small village indistinguishable from a thousand other microcosms
of Rockwell romance but for the two lone gadzillionaires, Morales
the patriarch of enamel pots and Gerts the town imbecile, incalculable
purchaser of not one but two winner-takes-all Lotto tickets
for a fortune he cannot himself calculate the value of with his 85 IQ.
The stepfather writing about the stepson choosing to make the most
of what is or worsen what has already happened. The life sentences failing
to take shape as break away from Cubicle-22 or breakthrough to REAL
quality. Reply "they're cumulus-stratus" to remark that "they're neat"
saying nothing either way something different about the second man
asserting his need to be known for knowing something the first man
is presumed to be ignorant of, separating the two showing the first wanting
to connect and the second needing recognition for his knowledge. Red-
haired woman smoking cigarette as she carries coffee grounds garbage bag
around Natural Foods bakery seen as consoling by man brown-haired
once a self-described neohippy with long pony-tail and no smoking habit
of his own. Whirr of traffic objects moving by on city main street behind
parked car another person sits in scribbling notes worrying subject
because the sounds appear as pun after noise before concerns about unvoiced
global warming or warnings. The events in the dream currently analyzed
by woman keeping time with ex alive in her mind occurring in randomly selected
order, not sequences. Craning neck to turn head left and right to view
who's not there as he thinks of his spouse at home and whether she's ok
and he's ok that he's out and about. The brilliant white clouds gorgeous and huge
drifting by in sizes large, medium, and small as blue sky behind goes
in the same direction but at much slower pace. Five cars or trucks or vans
lined along side street and enroute to another road each hosting single occupants
thinking about turning left or right separately. Time itself a waste
of conceptual space in the mind which stores objects as if they're anti-matter.
What to observe perplexing the man questioning his modes of observation and
the value of same. A world filled with so