Happy 2015

Words Of Wisdom

There is creative reading as well as creative writing.


~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Review of 2014

There were a number of accomplishments is year. I wrote poems, read two books per month (crazy), improved my writing. My major accomplishment was reading five books by Jack Kerouac. The titles were: Beat Reader
          Jack's Book- Oral Biography
          Dharma Bums-liked this book the best
          Big Sur
          Atop an Underwood  

I am a big fan of the Beat Generation. I learned much more about Kerouac from many different perspectives. To me he was the best of them. He lived life rather than intellectualize what life is and should be. Kerouac has more more that I will read in 2015. 

Another achievement is that my interest in horror stories. I read Bram Stoker's (of Dracula Fame) horror stories and found them very creative and the type of horror that I hope to write about. It's funny but several years I thought that horror stories were junk. Edgar Allan Poe changed my thoughts about the genre when I read The Fall Of The House Of Usher.

I didn't write as much as the previous year but looked at ways to improve the poems I've already written. It's an ongoing process. Overall, 2014 was a productive year.  

Found This Poem Interesting And Appropriate

Christmas Trees

Robert Frost, 1874 - 1963

A Christmas circular letter
  
  
The city had withdrawn into itself  
And left at last the country to the country;  
When between whirls of snow not come to lie  
And whirls of foliage not yet laid, there drove  
A stranger to our yard, who looked the city,   
Yet did in country fashion in that there  
He sat and waited till he drew us out,  
A-buttoning coats, to ask him who he was.  
He proved to be the city come again  
To look for something it had left behind   
And could not do without and keep its Christmas.  
He asked if I would sell my Christmas trees;  
My woods—the young fir balsams like a place  
Where houses all are churches and have spires.  
I hadn’t thought of them as Christmas trees.    
I doubt if I was tempted for a moment  
To sell them off their feet to go in cars  
And leave the slope behind the house all bare,  
Where the sun shines now no warmer than the moon.  
I’d hate to have them know it if I was.      
Yet more I’d hate to hold my trees, except  
As others hold theirs or refuse for them,  
Beyond the time of profitable growth—  
The trial by market everything must come to.  
I dallied so much with the thought of selling.      
Then whether from mistaken courtesy  
And fear of seeming short of speech, or whether  
From hope of hearing good of what was mine,  
I said, “There aren’t enough to be worth while.”
  
“I could soon tell how many they would cut,     
You let me look them over.”  
 
                                    “You could look.  
But don’t expect I’m going to let you have them.”  
Pasture they spring in, some in clumps too close  
That lop each other of boughs, but not a few     
Quite solitary and having equal boughs  
All round and round. The latter he nodded “Yes” to,  
Or paused to say beneath some lovelier one,  
With a buyer’s moderation, “That would do.”  
I thought so too, but wasn’t there to say so.   
We climbed the pasture on the south, crossed over,  
And came down on the north. 
 
                                    He said, “A thousand.”  
  
“A thousand Christmas trees!—at what apiece?”  
  
He felt some need of softening that to me:       
“A thousand trees would come to thirty dollars.”  
  
Then I was certain I had never meant  
To let him have them. Never show surprise!  
But thirty dollars seemed so small beside  
The extent of pasture I should strip, three cents    
(For that was all they figured out apiece)—   
Three cents so small beside the dollar friends  
I should be writing to within the hour  
Would pay in cities for good trees like those,  
Regular vestry-trees whole Sunday Schools     
Could hang enough on to pick off enough.
  
A thousand Christmas trees I didn’t know I had!  
Worth three cents more to give away than sell,  
As may be shown by a simple calculation.  
Too bad I couldn’t lay one in a letter.       
I can’t help wishing I could send you one,  
In wishing you herewith a Merry Christmas.

Christmas Wish

Words Of Wisdom

Poetry and beauty are always making peace. When you read something beautiful you find coexistence; it breaks walls down. 

~Mahmoud Darwish,Palestinian poet (1941-2008)

The Shining

This horror thriller will be shown at the IFC Center on 6th Avenue and West 3rd Street in Greenwich Village.

Dec. 25-27 @ 11:30pm.

I saw this film many years ago. It's was a weird movie but I enjoyed it.  

Mary Poppins

This classic musical will be shown at the Film Forum on Sunday December 28th at 11 AM. For further info go to 

www.filmforum.com

Words Of Wisdom

Nothing ever becomes real till it is experienced.

~John Keats, Poet (1795-1821) 

Poem

He left behind everything he ever knew
Gone were the reminders of his former life 
Couldn't go back! Wouldn't go back!
The farther he journeyed, the fetters of his
Former life broke.
The anchor of the ship was hoisted 
He set sail on the open sea of life.

Poetry Marathon

The 41st Annual New Year's Day Poetry Marathon will be here in sixteen days. I have attended many times and enjoy the many form of poetry from poets both famous and not so famous. It will be at St. Marks Church In The Bowery at 131 East 10th Street (near Second Avenue). 

For further info go to:

 www.poetryproject.org

The Postman

Here is a '40s noir classic playing at the Film Forum today and tomorrow.


www.filmforum.com

Words Of Wisdom

The poet doesn't invent. He listens.

~Jean Cocteau, Director (1889-1963)

Books And More Books

I went to the bookstore yesterday with my wife. She purchased a couple of books while decided not to. I look at my bookcase and see all the books that I have to read. It's amazing that I have all these books and have yet to read them. I've read a lot of books this year. Goes to show you that there's a lot of quality (and not so quality) literature out there.   

I've fallen a little behind because of some personal issues but I'm back at it now. There are times I wonder if I'm a little wacky for reading so much and there are other times where I feel the need to know more. I don't know if there will ever be a happy medium but I do enjoy the challenge.

Early Thoughts

Some early thoughts about Thanksgiving.

Words Of Wisdom

Poetry is the art of creating imaginary gardens with real toads.

~Marianne Moore, Poet (1887-1972)

Article

Read this article in one of the local papers.




http://www.otdowntown.com/local-news/20141112/city-cuts-fringe-fest-funding

Quirky Characters

I like quirky and unusual characters in my stories. As antagonists they can make stories interesting. I find I enjoy creating characters who you wouldn't suspect could reek so much evil. An example is the beautiful refined young woman who is a serial killer. Or it could be a plain ordinary looking person who holds the world hostage to his evil deeds. 

Characters come in all sizes, shapes, races, and genders. The trick is to make the story so that you wouldn't suspect that they are what they are. Quirky characters aren't necessarily held to convention or care what others think about them. They just go about their lives in their unusual ways, even if it is strange to us as readers.

Words Of WIsdom

There is much more to being a patriot and a citizen than reciting a pledge or raising the flag.

~Jesse Ventura (b. 1952)

Honor Our Veteran's

Let's pause and pay respects to our veterans who proudly served our country. Thank them for their service and sacrifice.

Today's Word

PALEO-

Old, ancient; reference to former geologic time time periods.

Words Of Wisdom

A poem is true if it hangs together. Information points to something else. A poem points to nothing but itself.

~E.M. Forster, Novelist (1879-1970)

Poem

Message To The Artist

Write your stories!
Compose your songs
Draw your pictures
Educate the masses
Tell them that all is not lost
Encourage! Challenge!
Deliver your oratories!

by Genevieve

Words Of Wisdom

Perseverance is failing 19 times and succeeding the 20th.


~Julie Andrews, Actress (b.1935)

Today's Word

MAGNANIMITY

To disdain meanness and pettiness; display generosity.

Diplomacy

A friend and I are going to see this movie tomorrow night at the Film Forum downtown. I've never heard of it but I'm looking forward to seeing it. I'll give a review after I see it.

Today's Word

-GRAPH, n.

Something written or drawn - ex. monograph

Instrument for making or transmitting records>electrocardiograph

Ex.phonograph, telegraph

Words Of Wisdom

Poetry: the best words in the best order.


~Samuel Taylor Coleridge,Poet (1772-1834)

San Francisco Bay Guardian Shuts Its Doors

I read today that the San Francisco Bay Guardian has closed its doors after 48 years. The progressive newspaper, which dealt with controversial topics and supported TLGB  causes was sold to the San Francisco Media Company in 2012. The paper had been losing money for years.  

Many progressive papers have been taken over by large corporations and conglomerates. What I see is a silencing of the voices of the average citizen. Here in New York City, the Village Voice was once one of the most progressive papers in the country. Back in the sixties and seventies the issues were sometimes as much as 100 pages and more. It dealt with controversial topics and radical in its views. It covered many alternative events and people. Today, the Voice is nothing but advertisements and shallow,dumbed-down  articles with little redeeming value or social relevance. 

I read the Guardian on occasion and enjoyed the viewpoints of some of their stories. She had a good run. Whether the Guardian can be resurrected is still in question. I just hope that the progressive voice will not be shut out.

Today's Word

METONYMY

A figure of speech in which one word or phrase is substituted for another with which it is closely associated. 

ex. Washington>U.S. government; crown> monarchy  

TODAY'S WORD

HOMUNCULUS

A little man; manikin 

Film Fest In Hollywood and Houston

Those of you who live in Los Angeles, the Hollywood Film Festival begins tonight, October 16th, and goes through October 19th.

www.hollywoodfilmfestival.com


For my friends in Houston, there will be the Houston Cinema Arts Festival from November 12-16. 
For info go to www.cinemaartssociety.org 

Today's Word

HERMOSA

Spanish word which means 'beautiful'.

Words Of Wisdom

When power leads man toward arrogance, poetry reminds him of his limitations. When power narrows the areas of man's concern, poetry reminds him of the richness and diversity of existence. When power corrupts, poetry cleanses.

~John F. Kennedy, U S President (1917-1963) 

Today's Word

ARCHIPELAGO, n.

A group of islands

A sea or stretch of water containing many islands.

Electric Lady Studio

I have passed by Electric Lady for as long as I can remember. It was much later I learned that this historic place was the brainchild of guitarist extraordinaire Jimi Hendrix (1942-1970) and his manager Michael Jeffrey. Jimi's vision was to have musicians from all over the world record and play there. Sadly, Jimi Hendrix never lived to see this happen.

Some great musicians have passed through Electric Lady: Jeff Beck, U2, AC/DC, Bob Dylan, The Clash, and Hall& Oates. Jimi recorded at Electric Lady for about 4 weeks. The studio opened on August 26th, 1970.Three weeks later, Hendrix was dead. He left a state-of-the art studio which still produces some of the greatest music in the world.

Today's Word

PROSODY

The science or study of poetic meters and versification.

White Horse Tavern

I don't usually write about bars, but the White Horse Tavern is a famous part of the history of New York and famous in the literary scene. 

Originally a place where longshoreman could get a brew, it became a gathering place for poets, writers, and artist during the 1950s and 1960s. It's most famous patron was the Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas (below), who recited poetry and drank. He died in November, 1953 a few blocks away at St Vincent's Hospital.  

Other famous patrons were James Baldwin, Bob Dylan, Jane Jacobs, Jack Kerouac, Norman Mailer, Jim Morrison, and Mary Travers (Peter, Paul, and Mary). The Village Voice is said to have started here. 

I passed by the place many times and it's lively and active, especially when the sidewalk seating is open.

Poetry Tomorrow Night 10/10

OMNIDAWN'S ANNUAL POETRY AND  CELEBRATION READING

Friday, October 10 @6PM

Poets's House-Elizabeth Kray Hall
10 River Terrace
New York, NY
Tel.: (212) 431-7920

Free and open to the public

For further info. go to: www.poetshouse.org 

Today's Word

THRENODY, n.

A song of lamentation for the dead, elegy.

Words Of Wisdom

Today's Word

JOUISSANCE

Pleasure; sexual pleasure; orgasm.

Are Poets Rebels?

It seems that when despots take over a country, one of the areas that is taken control of is the media and the arts. All of a sudden poets, actors, and creative types are suddenly obsolete. Here in this country the arts and recreation has been taken out of schools. 

I wonder why are poets a threat to the status quo? Is it because we speak the truth? In the 1940s and 1950s The Beats, led by Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, presented literature in a more open and unconventional style during the staid years after the war. In the 1950s and 1960s, the confessional poets like Robert Lowell, Anne Sexton, and Sylvia Plath wrote about topics that were considered taboo. Depression, mental illness, sexuality, drugs, and suicide were written about with honesty and clarity by the authors.

I've never considered myself a rebel but, maybe I am but don't it. Poetry is to encourage, inform, challenge and create. I want to make a difference in someone's life and this is one forum that is open to me. I have listened to many other poets of all ages and stripes. Each person has their on unique style and voice. Get your work and your voice out because the world needs to hear.

Pictures

I love taking photos using either my phone or a digital camera. I believe that a picture with words adds life and beauty to them.  I believe one needs to to judicious as to when a photo is appropriate. Too many may seem to be more about the photo rather than the words.

Today's Word

PATRON, n.

A person who gives money and support to an artist, organization, etc.


I have heard this word mentioned much over the past couple of weeks. I read today how Olive Higgins Prouty, who authored Stella Dallas,  became a friend and patron to one Sylvia Plath who wrote the poetry in Ariel. Many famous artists have had patrons who supported and befriended them. I'm sure that it's done today but I wonder if in the same magnitude.

When the bourgeois got involved it became more of them building kingdoms and glory for themselves rather than nurturing and supporting the up and coming artists. I began writing poetry almost three years ago and I read occasionally at open mics. Some folks that I've spoken to have said that they received support from another artist or organization.

Chapbooks have opened a way for new writers to get in pr int because the larger publishing house have become concerned with only the writers who will make them money. It's really a shame because they may lose out on an opportunity to nurture some budding writer. There is the need for more patrons.

Today's Word

PRE-

1. Before, prior to earlier than. 
    ex.- prehistoric

2. In advance.  Ex.-prepay.

Today's Word

BHIKKU

A Buddhist monk or religious mendicant (order).

Words Of Wisdom

To read a poem is to hear it with our own eyes; to hear it is to see with our own ears.


~Octavio Paz, Mexican Poet (1914-1998)

The Confessional Poets

Confessional poetry came on the literary scene in the 1950s. Those men and women wrote about topics which affected them deeply. Mental illness, divorce, sexuality, infidelity and death were taboo subjects brought out in the open.

I have read the work of Sylvia Plath, Anne Sexton and John Berryman and have come to understand the pain they felt about certain events in their lives. I never experienced a close family member committing suicide (Berryman's father) or being institutionalized (Sexton) however I can see how these traumatic events shaped the way they wrote. The fact that the confessional poets would share openly these events to the public is a testament to their honestly and clarity of their true feelings.

Some other confessional poets are Robert Lowell, who taught both Plath and Sexton, W.D.Snodgrass, Sharon Olds and Marie Howe.  


























.

Today's Word

PELL-MELL

In mingled confusion or disorder.


Ex. Papers strewn pell-mell on the desk.

Centennial Celebration

There will be a centennial celebration paying homage to Octavio Paz (1914-1998) on Tuesday, October 7, at Poets House in lower Manhattan.

 For details and information go to:

 www.poetshouse.org

Film Of A Tennessee Williams Play

If you are a fan of Tennessee Williams and live in New York City, you are in luck. From September 26 to October 5th, films based on his stories will be shown at the Film Forum. Tomorrow night, September 30th, the feature film will be The Night Of The Iguana. 

For information go to www.filmforum.com

Today's Word

VIRIDIAN

A chrome green pigment that is a hydrated oxide of chromium.

Today's Word

INTEGUMENT

Something that covers or encloses.
An enveloping layer of an orgasm such as skin or membrane.

Words Of Wisdom

Over every mountain there is a path, although it may not be seen from the valley.


~Theodore Roethke, Poet (1908-1963)

Frances W. Harper

Today's Word

SESTINA

A fixed verse form consisting of six stanzas of six lines each followed by a three-line envoi.

RECOMMENDATIONS

If you are a fan of Sylvia Plath, I recommend two of her poetry books, Ariel and The Colossus.

Todsy's Word

BOUDOIR

A ladies private bedroom, sitting room or dressing room.

Current Book

My current book is The Education Of The Negro by Carter G. Woodson. Read in conjunction with The Mis-Education Of the Negro, one will come to a greater understand of how the education system as present constructed affects black Americans.

Writers And Critics

Yesterday I read the bio of Grace Metalious, the author of the controversial best seller Peyton Place. I read that twenty five after her death the town where she came from still hadn't forgiven Metalious. Why? Because she revealed that behind the sometime idyllic image of small towns, there was stuff happening that were never mentioned out in public (wife beating, cheating, etc.). Ms. Metalious was simply telling the truth.

I have read how many writers were villified by critics because they did not write in the style that was conventional during the time. Jack Kerouac was constantly panned by critics yet his books are still influential today. His best seller, On The Road, Why? Perhaps he actually lived and experienced life rather than intellectualize about it. Kerouac also touched on subjects that were taboo such as drugs and sexuality. Herman Melville's Moby Dick did not sell with the public or with critics though it was a well written book. Like Kerouac, he experienced and lived life.

I admit I am loathe to criticize other writers. I can think of books that I didn't enjoy reading but others did. The same thing is true with music, actors, plays, politicians, cities, etc. I guess what bothers me is when people's biases taint both the author and the reader. Fortunately, Herman Melville had a second career as a poet. His novels such as Typee and Bartleby are underrated.   I tend to gravitate to writers who are brilliant in their craft and yet never got the recognition they so richly deserved.

Article

I read this article the other day. I thought at it may have some interest to the audience.

www.guardian.com/2013/jul/28/

Today's Word

ESTAMINET, n.

A small café in France that sells alcoholic drinks.

Today's Word

SCHOLIAST, n.

A commentator on ancient or classical literature.

Words Of Wisdom

Poetry is the opening and closing of a door, leaving those who look through to guess about what is seen during the moment.

~Carl Sandburg, Poet (1878-1967)

Writing Requires Patience

Writing requires much discipline and patience. Just whe you think a piece of writng is salable, you see something that is amiss. Misspelling, a useless sentence, writing what you meant in a different way. I have been working on a poem and a novella for quite a while bur they still don' t feel right.

In regards to the poem I know what I want to say but haven't found the right words in which to express it. Have you had times like this? It can be frustrating at times but I would rather write something I 'm comfortable with.  The late auth V.C. Andrews said that if the story she was writing was boring she didn't publish it because more than like the readers would be bored. Good piece of advice, I think.

Words Of Wisdom

Nothing ever becomes real till it is experienced.


~John Keats, Poet (1795-1821)

Anne Sexton

Anne Sexton (1928-1974) was one of a number of confessional poets which included Robert Lowell, Sylvia Plath, W.D. Snodgrass and John Berryman. Sexton was plagued by mental illness throughout much of her life. She suffered mental breakdowns after the birth of her two children. Sexton attempted suicide a number of times. 

I read a few of her poems and found them filled with sadness and anguish. Confessional poets touched on subjects that were considered taboo during 1950s and 1960s. Anne Sexton touched on subjects such as menstruation, abortion, drug addiction, and sexuality. She was a talented and skilled writer who ended her life by suicide. 

When I look at Anne Sexton's photos and pictures, I see sadness and emptiness in her eyes. What I admire about her is that she wrote about her own personal struggles and shared it with the public. To me that shows authenticity and courage on her part. It's sad that Anne Sexton could not overcome her struggles but she opened up a way where others like her could share their true feelings without being pretentious or bound by the conventions of her time. She and other confessional writers opened that door wide open.

Plath, W. D. Snodgrass, and othe

Writing Ideas Never Take A Break

Writing can cover virtually any topic. Like the blue horizon, writing encompasses every human emotion. When I recently experienced a down time, I war something new about my life and from a different perspective. Other people's stories can mirror ours and vice-versa. 

I have been writing every day no matter how much or how little. Looking at my slices of life that I live in, there's so much happening. I try not to limit myself as far as ideas go. Just size up the situation ad see what I can come up with. The main idea is to write and create my own vision.

Words Of Wisdom

Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.

~William James

Book Review

Title: Wilderness-The Lost Writings Of Jim Morrison-Volume I
Publisher: Vintage Books  New York  Copyright 1988    
Rating: 6.5

Morrison's poetry was strange to say the least, but it was uniquely his own. It's to bad that there are no dates when Jim wrote these words. I recognize some lines right away. For example, on page 99 it has the lines
   Motel, money, murder, madness
   Change the mood from glad to sadness.
These two lines were featured in the song L.A. Woman. I found this pattern scattered throughout Wilderness. Morrison's intellectual and creativity challenged the conventions of his time, which I lived through. His poetry was as complex as he was. I wonder if he really wanted us to really know what he was thinking?   

Writing a Novella

I was talking with my spouse about writing and the things that go into it. She write horror stories and is trying to think of something to write about. I was looking over a novella I am writing and realized that I need to tighten up the structure.

 I read Herman Melville's Bartleby and saw how I need to focus on one particular time in the protagonist's life. Jack Kerouac's Subterraneans is another novella that I will read. I've written numerous short stories in the past so writing a novella is no different save the fact that it is longer, a short novel if you will. I have a protagonist and am further developing his character. 

Character development  has become one of my favorite parts about writing. As I mentioned in the past, I like quirky characters who do not fit the mold of being strange or weird. Guess that's the creative part of me.

Words Of Wisdom

And the idea of just wandering off to a cafe with a notebook and writing and seeing where that takes me for awhile s just bliss. 

~J. K. Rowling

Another Underrated Performer

Sam Cooke (1931-1964) was a singer with a smooth sound and a great entertainer. He was popular during 1950s and 1960s with songs like 'You Send Me', 'Chain Gang', 'A Change Is Gonna Come'  and 'Bring It On Home To Me'. Tragically, Sam Cooke was murdered in Los Angeles in December, 1964.

Writing Every Day

I make it a point of writing every day. It doesn't  matter how much but the fact that I write something. Too many times I've saw events or people which interested me but I didn't take note of them. The original thought I had is forever lost. I carry a notebook and pen everywhere I go and make note of little things that capture my thoughts.  

Words Of Wisdom

Writers were influenced by other writers preceding them. Conversely, today's writer will influence a generation of future writers.

Underrated

This a list of performers I believe were underrated during their careers. I'm sure that you have your own list.

Jackie Wilson 
Curtis Mayfield
The Hollies
The Moments

I'll add more along the way.

Early Writings of Jack Kerouac

This is my current reading.

Visiting The Places The Authors Were

Have you imagined that you could visit the places your favorite author has been and/or describes in their work? I can't go back to the 1800s but I can imagine and research that era. A time machine would help (smile)! 

When I read Jack Kerouac's Dharma Bums and Big Sur, I researched the Oregon and Washington coastlines along with Big Sur in California.  I Googled photos of these places and found them to be unchanged in some instances. I plan on visiting these places in the next year or so.

Where I live now I could write a story, poem or essay about a particular place, person, or event. When you actually live through a particular time in history, it makes the article that more thrilling.

Words Of Wisdom

A poet is someone who can pour light into a cup, then raise it to nourish your beautiful parched holy mouth.


~Hafiz 

Book Review

Title: Jack's Book-An Oral Biography Of Jack Kerouac
Author: Barry Gifford and Lawrence Lee
Publisher: Penguin Books, Copyright 1978 
Rating: 8

I admit I'm picky about biographies because at times they can gloss over the person's failing and shortcomings. I enjoyed reading Jack's Book because  I hear the voices of Jack's friends and lovers and what they thought of him. 

Allen Ginsberg and Neal Cassady seemed to have the most influence on Kerouac for different reason. Kerouac learned much from Ginsberg but he wanted to be like Cassady. To me Kerouac was a momma's boy would couldn't seem to do much without her approval. Her influence on him was both caring and smothering. He wanted to be like Neal Cassady yet didn't seem to make the break from is mother's apron strings. 

I've read several of Kerouac's: On The Road, Dharma Bums and Big Sur.  Though I understood what he was saying, Jack's Book put me in his company and with his friends. Kerouac wanted to be noted as a writer but couldn't handle the fame when it came his way. Jack was a complicated person who was a modern day Hamlet; living between the days after WWII and the coming counter culture he came to detest. Two constants in his life were his conservative beliefs and his Catholicism.

Kerouac's last years were marred by alcoholism, tragedies, bitterness, loneliness and the sense that his life had been meaningless. This is a sad commentary for a man who tried to influence his contemporaries into a new way of thinking and writing. His books still resonate with audiences today. Jack's Book will give you a glimpse of Jack Kerouac and the friends who knew him best.  

Wilderness

I have decided to read a book of poems while reading a novel, biography or whatever other book. Rock and roll legend Jim Morrison was also a poet. The front man of the sixties rock group The Doors wrote poetry from his childhood to until the end of his life. Wilderness-The Lost Writings of Jim Morrison is a revealing look into the fragile, creative mind of a man searching for freedom. 

Morrison, as with Jack Kerouac,  is one of those people who totally fascinates me because their work was something no one had ever read nor try to put a label on. Jim Morrison poetry is as haunting as the many songs that he wrote. A review of the book is forthcoming.

Releasing The Spirit Through Poetry

I look at poetry as an opportunity to release the spirit of our real nature. We can speak free of whatever is on our hearts and minds. No outside entity can control what's on the heart. It's one reason I began writing poetry.

Poetic words can flow like a river. It can rise up like a storm or be dropped into our hearts as if a seed is being planted. It wasn't long after I began writing that I realized how much I had to say. There were things inside of me that needed to be shared with others. My own spirit was bound up and I didn't realize it or maybe the words were stored up until my epiphany came. The point is is that began writing poetry. 

I'm not sure as to what style I possess. the idea is to write freely without restraint from disciplines, trends, others criticisms. The point is to write. As I improve on the craft of poetry writing, I want to keep it fresh and natural. Each of us has his/her own style and we should not stifle it or try to emulate others. We go through experiences that are unique only to us as individuals.

When others read and hear your words you are sharing a part of your soul. People respond to it in different ways but it's you nevertheless. 

Words Of Wisdom

No man is free who is not master of himself.


~Chinese Proverb

St. Mark's Bookshop's New Digs

I visited the new digs of St. Mark's Bookshop about ten days ago. It's a smaller place which, happily, is still in the East Village. It still has the many titles it had at the larger place on Third Avenue. Still has many items on the sale section.  The shelves are along the walls in a somewhat circular fashion which goes around the whole store.  

I have only been there once so I don't really have a feel as to how the store will do. Events such as reading are held there from time to time. I wonder how they will set the place up for such events. I will need to go there more often to find that out. I'm just happy that another independent bookstore didn't bite the dust.

Newfest

The annual Newfest Film Festival starts today and will run through July 29th. I will try to get to a couple of films and report about it.

Words Of Wisdom

Even during the dry periods, there's always something to write about. Your just have to work your way through the brush.

Kerouac's Biography

This is another book about beat author Jack Kerouac, biography. The authors, Barry Gifford  and Lawrence Lee talked with the people who knew and influenced Kerouac throughout his life. I'm not complete reading the book but already I like it. 

I'm a bit picky about bios because they can appear to to sanitized versions about the person. If someone wanted to write a biography about me I want it to be honest, warts and all. Thus far I am getting that impression. A review is forthcoming.

Cheryl B.

Cheryl Burke (1972-2011) was a  journalist, spoken word poet, performance artist and playwright. She was part of the East Village art scene in New York City. I never saw her at a live performance but watched one on YouTube.

 I followed her since the time I came out as transgender. I loved her biting wit and sense of humor. Known as Cheryl B., I took a liking to her after reading some of her work. Somehow she connected with me. She was more known as a performance artist having performed at many poetry venues in New York City. 

 

Cheryl was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma in 2010 and died in 2011 from complications. She was only 38. I was shocked and saddened when I heard the news. Cheryl B. was a vibrant artist outspoken, witty and gifted in her craft. I loved that she had been sober for nine years. She made a point of mentioning that on the anniversary of it. I was also happy when finally had a partner, Kelli Dunham.  Cheryl was a reason that I began writing poetry over two years ago.

Rest in peace, Cheryl. It 's been three and I still miss you.

Poem

Dawn Revisited

BY Rita dove

Imagine you wake up

with a second chance: The blue jay

hawks his pretty wares

and the oak still stands, spreading

glorious shade. If you don't look back,

the future never happens.

How good to rise in sunlight,

in the prodigal smell of biscuits -

eggs and sausage on the grill.

The whole sky is yours

to write on, blown open

to a blank page. Come on,

shake a leg! You'll never know

who's down there, frying those eggs,

if you don't get up and see.

Words Of Wisdom

Great things are not accomplished by those who yield to trends and fads and popular opinion.

~Jack Kerouac

Trying Other Genres

I maintain that it's good to try your hand writing a different genre. I have written short stories, essays, commentaries, and poetry. I have dabbled in writing a few very short plays. I'm trying my hand at writing a novella. I'm not all that keen on writing a novel but that could change in the future. 

It's good to try out different genres just to break up the monotony that sometimes comes into a writer's life. It the reason I moved to poetry a couple of years back. I felt my story and essays getting stale. Poetry seemed to revitalize them. I also believe that it expands the way one sees a story. 

Words Of Wisdom

Poetry is an echo, asking a shadow to dance.

~Carl Sandburg

Poem

Dawn Revisited

BY Rita dove

Imagine you wake up

with a second chance: The blue jay

hawks his pretty wares

and the oak still stands, spreading

glorious shade. If you don't look back,

the future never happens.

How good to rise in sunlight,

in the prodigal smell of biscuits -

eggs and sausage on the grill.

The whole sky is yours

to write on, blown open

to a blank page. Come on,

shake a leg! You'll never know

who's down there, frying those eggs,

if you don't get up and see.

Writing Life

My writing is going through some changes. I'm looking at some of my old stories seeing ways that they can be improved. I have been working on some new poems also. A review of a novella I'm writing could use some revision also.   Such is the life of a writer.

Favorite Authors

My Favorite Authors

Edgar Allan Poe
Langston Hughes
Paul Laurence Dunbar
Sylvia Plath
Herman Melville
Jack Kerouac

On My Radar

Thomas Merton
Charles Baudelaire
Jim Morrison

Back in Groove

I have been back in the groove of writing again. I have written a few poems. I'm looking over some old stories and seeing if they can be improved. I'm basically looking for length because I don't believe that some of them are long enough. 

I have a couple of long poems that I've been working on for a couple of years.I rewrite and rewrite but it just doesn't feel right. I guess that's what all writers go through. It's interesting that I learn something new each time I write.

Words Of Wisdom

Writing is an extreme privilege but it's also a gift. It is a gift to yourself. and it's a gift of giving a story to someone. 

~Amy Tan

Allen Ginsberg's Birthday

Today is Allen Ginsberg's birthday, who would have been eighty-eight had he lived. What better way to honor his memory than reading his most famous poem.

Howl

BY allen Ginsberg

For Carl Solomon

I

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,

dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,

angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,

who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz,

who bared their brains to Heaven under the El and saw Mohammedan angels staggering on tenement roofs illuminated,

who passed through universities with radiant cool eyes hallucinating Arkansas and Blake-light tragedy among the scholars of war,

who were expelled from the academies for crazy & publishing obscene odes on the windows of the skull,

who cowered in unshaven rooms in underwear, burning their money in wastebaskets and listening to the Terror through the wall,

who got busted in their pubic beards returning through Laredo with a belt of marijuana for New York,

who ate fire in paint hotels or drank turpentine in Paradise Alley, death, or purgatoried their torsos night after night

with dreams, with drugs, with waking nightmares, alcohol and cock and endless balls,

incomparable blind streets of shuddering cloud and lightning in the mind leaping toward poles of Canada & Paterson, illuminating all the motionless world of Time between,

Peyote solidities of halls, backyard green tree cemetery dawns, wine drunkenness over the rooftops, storefront boroughs of teahead joyride neon blinking traffic light, sun and moon and tree vibrations in the roaring winter dusks of Brooklyn, ashcan rantings and kind king light of mind,

who chained themselves to subways for the endless ride from Battery to holy Bronx on benzedrine until the noise of wheels and children brought them down shuddering mouth-wracked and battered bleak of brain all drained of brilliance in the drear light of Zoo,

who sank all night in submarine light of Bickford’s floated out and sat through the stale beer afternoon in desolate Fugazzi’s, listening to the crack of doom on the hydrogen jukebox,

who talked continuously seventy hours from park to pad to bar to Bellevue to museum to the Brooklyn Bridge,

a lost battalion of platonic conversationalists jumping down the stoops off fire escapes off windowsills off Empire State out of the moon,

yacketayakking screaming vomiting whispering facts and memories and anecdotes and eyeball kicks and shocks of hospitals and jails and wars,

whole intellects disgorged in total recall for seven days and nights with brilliant eyes, meat for the Synagogue cast on the pavement,

who vanished into nowhere Zen New Jersey leaving a trail of ambiguous picture postcards of Atlantic City Hall,

suffering Eastern sweats and Tangerian bone-grindings and migraines of China under junk-withdrawal in Newark’s bleak furnished room,   

who wandered around and around at midnight in the railroad yard wondering where to go, and went, leaving no broken hearts,

who lit cigarettes in boxcars boxcars boxcars racketing through snow toward lonesome farms in grandfather night,

who studied Plotinus Poe St. John of the Cross telepathy and bop kabbalah because the cosmos instinctively vibrated at their feet in Kansas,   

who loned it through the streets of Idaho seeking visionary indian angels who were visionary indian angels,

who thought they were only mad when Baltimore gleamed in supernatural ecstasy,

who jumped in limousines with the Chinaman of Oklahoma on the impulse of winter midnight streetlight smalltown rain,

who lounged hungry and lonesome through Houston seeking jazz or sex or soup, and followed the brilliant Spaniard to converse about America and Eternity, a hopeless task, and so took ship to Africa,

who disappeared into the volcanoes of Mexico leaving behind nothing but the shadow of dungarees and the lava and ash of poetry scattered in fireplace Chicago,

who reappeared on the West Coast investigating the FBI in beards and shorts with big pacifist eyes sexy in their dark skin passing out incomprehensible leaflets,

who burned cigarette holes in their arms protesting the narcotic tobacco haze of Capitalism,

who distributed Supercommunist pamphlets in Union Square weeping and undressing while the sirens of Los Alamos wailed them down, and wailed down Wall, and the Staten Island ferry also wailed,

who broke down crying in white gymnasiums naked and trembling before the machinery of other skeletons,

who bit detectives in the neck and shrieked with delight in policecars for committing no crime but their own wild cooking pederasty and intoxication,

who howled on their knees in the subway and were dragged off the roof waving genitals and manuscripts,

who let themselves be fucked in the ass by saintly motorcyclists, and screamed with joy,

who blew and were blown by those human seraphim, the sailors, caresses of Atlantic and Caribbean love,

who balled in the morning in the evenings in rosegardens and the grass of public parks and cemeteries scattering their semen freely to whomever come who may,

who hiccuped endlessly trying to giggle but wound up with a sob behind a partition in a Turkish Bath when the blond & naked angel came to pierce them with a sword,

who lost their loveboys to the three old shrews of fate the one eyed shrew of the heterosexual dollar the one eyed shrew that winks out of the womb and the one eyed shrew that does nothing but sit on her ass and snip the intellectual golden threads of the craftsman’s loom,

who copulated ecstatic and insatiate with a bottle of beer a sweetheart a package of cigarettes a candle and fell off the bed, and continued along the floor and down the hall and ended fainting on the wall with a vision of ultimate cunt and come eluding the last gyzym of consciousness,

who sweetened the snatches of a million girls trembling in the sunset, and were red eyed in the morning but prepared to sweeten the snatch of the sunrise, flashing buttocks under barns and naked in the lake,

who went out whoring through Colorado in myriad stolen night-cars, N.C., secret hero of these poems, cocksman and Adonis of Denver—joy to the memory of his innumerable lays of girls in empty lots & diner backyards, moviehouses’ rickety rows, on mountaintops in caves or with gaunt waitresses in familiar roadside lonely petticoat upliftings & especially secret gas-station solipsisms of johns, & hometown alleys too,

who faded out in vast sordid movies, were shifted in dreams, woke on a sudden Manhattan, and picked themselves up out of basements hung-over with heartless Tokay and horrors of Third Avenue iron dreams & stumbled to unemployment offices,

who walked all night with their shoes full of blood on the snowbank docks waiting for a door in the East River to open to a room full of steam-heat and opium,

who created great suicidal dramas on the apartment cliff-banks of the Hudson under the wartime blur floodlight of the moon & their heads shall be crowned with laurel in oblivion,

who ate the lamb stew of the imagination or digested the crab at the muddy bottom of the rivers of Bowery,

who wept at the romance of the streets with their pushcarts full of onions and bad music,

who sat in boxes breathing in the darkness under the bridge, and rose up to build harpsichords in their lofts,

who coughed on the sixth floor of Harlem crowned with flame under the tubercular sky surrounded by orange crates of theology,

who scribbled all night rocking and rolling over lofty incantations which in the yellow morning were stanzas of gibberish,

who cooked rotten animals lung heart feet tail borsht & tortillas dreaming of the pure vegetable kingdom,

who plunged themselves under meat trucks looking for an egg,

who threw their watches off the roof to cast their ballot for Eternity outside of Time, & alarm clocks fell on their heads every day for the next decade,

who cut their wrists three times successively unsuccessfully, gave up and were forced to open antique stores where they thought they were growing old and cried,

who were burned alive in their innocent flannel suits on Madison Avenue amid blasts of leaden verse & the tanked-up clatter of the iron regiments of fashion & the nitroglycerine shrieks of the fairies of advertising & the mustard gas of sinister intelligent editors, or were run down by the drunken taxicabs of Absolute Reality,

who jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge this actually happened and walked away unknown and forgotten into the ghostly daze of Chinatown soup alleyways & firetrucks, not even one free beer,

who sang out of their windows in despair, fell out of the subway window, jumped in the filthy Passaic, leaped on negroes, cried all over the street, danced on broken wineglasses barefoot smashed phonograph records of nostalgic European 1930s German jazz finished the whiskey and threw up groaning into the bloody toilet, moans in their ears and the blast of colossal steamwhistles,

who barreled down the highways of the past journeying to each other’s hotrod-Golgotha jail-solitude watch or Birmingham jazz incarnation,

who drove crosscountry seventytwo hours to find out if I had a vision or you had a vision or he had a vision to find out Eternity,

who journeyed to Denver, who died in Denver, who came back to Denver & waited in vain, who watched over Denver & brooded & loned in Denver and finally went away to find out the Time, & now Denver is lonesome for her heroes,

who fell on their knees in hopeless cathedrals praying for each other’s salvation and light and breasts, until the soul illuminated its hair for a second,

who crashed through their minds in jail waiting for impossible criminals with golden heads and the charm of reality in their hearts who sang sweet blues to Alcatraz,

who retired to Mexico to cultivate a habit, or Rocky Mount to tender Buddha or Tangiers to boys or Southern Pacific to the black locomotive or Harvard to Narcissus to Woodlawn to the daisychain or grave,

who demanded sanity trials accusing the radio of hypnotism & were left with their insanity & their hands & a hung jury,

who threw potato salad at CCNY lecturers on Dadaism and subsequently presented themselves on the granite steps of the madhouse with shaven heads and harlequin speech of suicide, demanding instantaneous lobotomy,

and who were given instead the concrete void of insulin Metrazol electricity hydrotherapy psychotherapy occupational therapy pingpong & amnesia,

who in humorless protest overturned only one symbolic pingpong table, resting briefly in catatonia,

returning years later truly bald except for a wig of blood, and tears and fingers, to the visible madman doom of the wards of the madtowns of the East,

Pilgrim State’s Rockland’s and Greystone’s foetid halls, bickering with the echoes of the soul, rocking and rolling in the midnight solitude-bench dolmen-realms of love, dream of life a nightmare, bodies turned to stone as heavy as the moon,

with mother finally ******, and the last fantastic book flung out of the tenement window, and the last door closed at 4 A.M. and the last telephone slammed at the wall in reply and the last furnished room emptied down to the last piece of mental furniture, a yellow paper rose twisted on a wire hanger in the closet, and even that imaginary, nothing but a hopeful little bit of hallucination—

ah, Carl, while you are not safe I am not safe, and now you’re really in the total animal soup of time—

and who therefore ran through the icy streets obsessed with a sudden flash of the alchemy of the use of the ellipsis catalogue a variable measure and the vibrating plane,

who dreamt and made incarnate gaps in Time & Space through images juxtaposed, and trapped the archangel of the soul between 2 visual images and joined the elemental verbs and set the noun and dash of consciousness together jumping with sensation of Pater Omnipotens Aeterna Deus

to recreate the syntax and measure of poor human prose and stand before you speechless and intelligent and shaking with shame, rejected yet confessing out the soul to conform to the rhythm of thought in his naked and endless head,

the madman bum and angel beat in Time, unknown, yet putting down here what might be left to say in time come after death,

and rose reincarnate in the ghostly clothes of jazz in the goldhorn shadow of the band and blew the suffering of America’s naked mind for love into an eli eli lamma lamma sabacthani saxophone cry that shivered the cities down to the last radio

with the absolute heart of the poem of life butchered out of their own bodies good to eat a thousand years.

II

What sphinx of cement and aluminum bashed open their skulls and ate up their brains and imagination?

Moloch! Solitude! Filth! Ugliness! Ashcans and unobtainable dollars! Children screaming under the stairways! Boys sobbing in armies! Old men weeping in the parks!

Moloch! Moloch! Nightmare of Moloch! Moloch the loveless! Mental Moloch! Moloch the heavy judger of men!

Moloch the incomprehensible prison! Moloch the crossbone soulless jailhouse and Congress of sorrows! Moloch whose buildings are judgment! Moloch the vast stone of war! Moloch the stunned governments!

Moloch whose mind is pure machinery! Moloch whose blood is running money! Moloch whose fingers are ten armies! Moloch whose breast is a cannibal dynamo! Moloch whose ear is a smoking tomb!

Moloch whose eyes are a thousand blind windows! Moloch whose skyscrapers stand in the long streets like endless Jehovahs! Moloch whose factories dream and croak in the fog! Moloch whose smoke-stacks and antennae crown the cities!

Moloch whose love is endless oil and stone! Moloch whose soul is electricity and banks! Moloch whose poverty is the specter of genius! Moloch whose fate is a cloud of sexless hydrogen! Moloch whose name is the Mind!

Moloch in whom I sit lonely! Moloch in whom I dream Angels! Crazy in Moloch! Cocksucker in Moloch! Lacklove and manless in Moloch!

Moloch who entered my soul early! Moloch in whom I am a consciousness without a body! Moloch who frightened me out of my natural ecstasy! Moloch whom I abandon! Wake up in Moloch! Light streaming out of the sky!

Moloch! Moloch! Robot apartments! invisible suburbs! skeleton treasuries! blind capitals! demonic industries! spectral nations! invincible madhouses! granite cocks! monstrous bombs!

They broke their backs lifting Moloch to Heaven! Pavements, trees, radios, tons! lifting the city to Heaven which exists and is everywhere about us!

Visions! omens! hallucinations! miracles! ecstasies! gone down the American river!

Dreams! adorations! illuminations! religions! the whole boatload of sensitive bullshit!

Breakthroughs! over the river! flips and crucifixions! gone down the flood! Highs! Epiphanies! Despairs! Ten years’ animal screams and suicides! Minds! New loves! Mad generation! down on the rocks of Time!

Real holy laughter in the river! They saw it all! the wild eyes! the holy yells! They bade farewell! They jumped off the roof! to solitude! waving! carrying flowers! Down to the river! into the street!

III

Carl Solomon! I’m with you in Rockland

   where you’re madder than I am

I’m with you in Rockland

   where you must feel very strange

I’m with you in Rockland

   where you imitate the shade of my mother

I’m with you in Rockland

   where you’ve murdered your twelve secretaries

I’m with you in Rockland

   where you laugh at this invisible humor

I’m with you in Rockland

   where we are great writers on the same dreadful typewriter

I’m with you in Rockland

   where your condition has become serious and is reported on the radio

I’m with you in Rockland

   where the faculties of the skull no longer admit the worms of the senses

I'm with you in Rockland

   where you drink the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica

I’m with you in Rockland

   where you pun on the bodies of your nurses the harpies of the Bronx

I’m with you in Rockland

   where you scream in a straightjacket that you’re losing the game of the actual pingpong of the abyss

I’m with you in Rockland

   where you bang on the catatonic piano the soul is innocent and immortal it should never die ungodly in an armed madhouse

I’m with you in Rockland

   where fifty more shocks will never return your soul to its body again from its pilgrimage to a cross in the void

I’m with you in Rockland

   where you accuse your doctors of insanity and plot the Hebrew socialist revolution against the fascist national Golgotha

I’m with you in Rockland

   where you will split the heavens of Long Island and resurrect your living human Jesus from the superhuman tomb

I’m with you in Rockland

   where there are twentyfive thousand mad comrades all together singing the final stanzas of the Internationale

I’m with you in Rockland

   where we hug and kiss the United States under our bedsheets the United States that coughs all night and won’t let us sleep

I’m with you in Rockland

   where we wake up electrified out of the coma by our own souls’ airplanes roaring over the roof they’ve come to drop angelic bombs the hospital illuminates itself    imaginary walls collapse    O skinny legions run outside    O starry-spangled shock of mercy the eternal war is here    O victory forget your underwear we’re free

I’m with you in Rockland

   in my dreams you walk dripping from a sea-journey on the highway across America in tears to the door of my cottage in the Western night

San Francisco, 1955—1956