Saturday, September 13, 2008



Charlie sez: hang on tight & swing into fall with my grampy's mildly vertiginous new book of poems The Age of Briggs & Stratton...


Paul Theroux on Republicans & Hunting
"I have no strong views on hunting, only the usual disgust when I see a creature senselessly slaughtered at no risk to the hunter - "a fabulous animal", as Thoreau called the moose, serving as no more than a target and an excuse for a stew. In a book Sarah Palin probably has not read (someone as philistine and driven as she is doesn't seem to have much time for reading, as her quest to ban books in the Wasilla public library probably indicates), Thoreau remarked on how moose sometimes weigh a thousand pounds, and how they "can step over a five-foot gate in their ordinary walk".

While people cheered, Palin was lauded for knowing how to "field-dress" a moose. Thoreau, who watched such an operation take place, wrote: "Joe [his Penobscot guide] now proceeded to skin the moose with a pocket knife, while I looked on, and a tragical business it was; to see that still warm and palpitating body pierced with a knife, to see the warm milk stream from the rent udder, and the ghastly naked red carcass appearing from within its seemly robe." I read that and somehow am not provoked to cheer..."

Friday, September 12, 2008


SEGUE READING SERIES
@ BOWERY POETRY CLUB

These events are made possible, in part,
with public funds from The New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency.
Saturdays: 4:00 p.m.–6:00 p.m.

308 BOWERY, just north of Houston
****$6 admission goes to support the readers****
Fall / Winter 2008–2009


The Segue Reading Series is made possible by the support of The Segue Foundation. For more information, please visit www.segue.org, bowerypoetry.com, or call (212) 614-0505. Curators: Oct.–Nov., Christina Strong & Alan Davies, Dec.–Jan., Evelyn Reilly & Thom Donovan.

OCTOBER

OCTOBER 4 E. TRACY GRINELL & HEATHER FULLER
E. Tracy Grinnell is the author of Some Clear Souvenir and Music or Forgetting, as well as the limited edition chapbooks Leukadia (forthcoming), Quadriga, a collaboration with Paul Foster Johnson, Of the Frame, and Harmonics. She lives in Brooklyn where she teaches writing and edits Litmus Press and Aufgabe, an annual journal of poetry and translations. Heather Fuller’s works include perhaps this is a rescue fantasy, Dovecote, and Startle Response. She is one of five poets featured on the narrow house recordings CD Women in the Avant Garde. She lives in Baltimore.

OCTOBER 11 MICHAEL GOTTLIEB & MITCH HIGHFILL
Michael Gottlieb is the author of thirteen books of poetry, most recently: The Likes Of Us. His essays on Jackson Mac Low and Proust are available at www.chax.com/eoagh.com. His long essay, “Jobs Of The Poets,” is available at jacketmagazine.com. Later this year Faux/Other will publish his memoir, excerpts of which are now available at the online magazine mark(s). Mitch Highfill is the author of Moth Light and Rebis. He recently performed parts of Moth Light accompanied by Natalia Paruz, also known as The Saw Lady. Recent work has appeared in OCHO and Critiphoria.

OCTOBER 18 TED PEARSON & DREW GARDNER
Ted Pearson is the author of sixteen books of poetry, including Evidence: 1975–1989, Planetary Gear, Songs Aside: 1992–2002, and Encryptions. He also co-edits markszine.com and is a co-author of The Grand Piano. He lives in Redlands, California. Drew Gardner’s books are Petroleum Hat and Sugar Pill. He lives in Harlem. He does musical collaborations with poets and conducts the Poetics Orchestra.

OCTOBER 25 PETER CULLEY & CARLA HARRYMAN
Peter Culley lives in South Wellington, British Columbia. His books include The Climax Forest, Hammertown, and The Age of Briggs & Stratton. Carla Harryman’s Adorno’s Noise will be released from Essay Press this fall. Recent publications include the book length poem Open Box, the novel Gardener of Stars, Baby, and the special edition Toujours l’épine es sous la rose. Harryman is co-editor of Lust for Life: On the Writings of Kathy Acker and a co-author of The Grand Piano: An Experiment in Collective Autobiography, San Francisco, 1975–1980.
THE SEGUE FOUNDATION

300 Bowery
New York, NY 10012


NOVEMBER

NOVEMBER 1 tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE & DARREN WERSHLER
tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE is sitting next to you right now. Depending. (He’s sitting) upon “how you define ‘next’”. When he does that, he’s doing ‘this’ too. Darren Wershler lives in Toronto and teaches new media and media history at Wilfrid Laurier University. His most recent books are The Iron Whim: A Fragmented History Of Typewriting, and Apostrophe (with Bill Kennedy).

NOVEMBER 8 KATHLEEN FRAZER & ALLISON COBB
Kathleen Fraser teaches at CCA/SF and annually migrates to Rome where she and NYC painter Hermine Ford recently showed wall texts from their on-going collaboration ii ss at Pratt Architecture Institute. (Pieces from this show currently up at Melville House, Dumbo/Brooklyn). Recent books: 20th Century, hi dde violeth i dde violet, Discrete Categories Forced Into Coupling, and W I T N E S S (artist book with Nancy Tokar Miller.) Allison Cobb is the author of Born2 and is at work on a long piece about the Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn. She was born in Los Alamos, New Mexico, and now lives in Brooklyn.

NOVEMBER 15 STEVE MCCAFFREY & KAREN MAC CORMAC
Steve McCaffery is the author of more than 21 volumes of poetry and four books of theory and criticism. His most recent title is Slightly Left of Thinking: Poems, Texts and Postcognitions. He lives in Buffalo where he is the David Gray Professor of Poetry and Letters at the University at Buffalo. Karen Mac Cormack is the author of more than a dozen books of poetry. Her most recent publication *Implexures* (the Complete Edition) was published in 2008 by Chax Press/West House Books.

NOVEMBER 22 KIT ROBINSON & BERNADETTE MAYER
Kit Robinson is a co-author of The Grand Piano: An Experiment in Collective Autobiography, San Francisco, 1975–1980. His books include The Messianic Trees: Selected Poems (forthcoming), 9:45, The Crave, and Democracy Boulevard. Kit lives in Berkeley. Bernadette Mayer is the author of Memory, Studying Hunger, A Bernadette Mayer Reader, Midwinter Day, and many other works. Forthcoming in 2008: Poetry State Forest, The Cave with Clark Coolidge, and Ethics Of Sleep.

NOVEMBER 29 NO READINGS—Happy holiday!

DECEMBER

DECEMBER 6 LESLIE SCALAPINO & ARNOLD J. KEMP
Leslie Scalapino is the author of thirty books of poetry, inter-genre fiction, and criticism. Among recent works are Day Ocean State of Stars’ Night and It’s go in horizontal/Selected Poems 1974–2006. Arnold J. Kemp is a visual artist and writer. His writing has appeared in Callaloo, Three Rivers Poetry Journal, Agni Review, Mirage #4 Period(ical), River Styx, Nocturnes, and Art Journal. In 2005 and 2007, Small Press Traffic commissioned two of his plays/performances for the San Francisco Poets Theater.

DECEMBER 13 STACY DORIS & DAWN LUNDY MARTIN
Stacy Doris’ books include Cheerleader’s Guide to the World: Council Book, Knot, Conference, Paramour, and Kildare. She also writes books in French and co-edited collections of new French poetry in translation. With Lisa Robertson, she is currently in the process of making audio recordings of 18th-century perfumes. Dawn Lundy Martin was awarded the 2006 Cave Canem Poetry Prize for A Gathering of Matter/A Matter of Gathering. She is also the author of The Morning Hour, selected in 2003 for the Poetry Society of America’s National Chapbook Fellowship.

DECEMBER 20 LARRY FAGIN & KYLE SCHLESINGER
Larry Fagin’s most recent publication is Dig & Delve, a collaboration with the artist Trevor Winkfield. He is the co-publisher of Adventures in Poetry books and the founder of Danspace, the dance program at St. Mark’s Church In-the-Bowery. Kyle Schlesinger’s books include The Pink, Hello Helicopter and Schablone Berlin with Caroline Koebel. With Thom Donovan and Michael Cross, he edits ON, a poetics journal that focuses on contemporaries.

DECEMBER 27 & JANUARY 3 NO READINGS—Happy holidays!

JANUARY

JANUARY 10 TONY CONRAD & CAROLEE SCHNEEMANN
Tony Conrad was a participant in the founding of minimal music and structural film. Recently his Yellow Movies (1972–73) have been exhibited at the Greene-Naftali and Daniel Buchholz galleries. His installation Beholden to Victory (1980–2007) opened in May at Overduin and Kite in L.A. Carolee Schneemann’s video, film, painting, photography, performance art and installation works have been shown at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, the New Museum of Contemporary Art, NYC, and Europe. Correspondence Course, edited by Kristine Stiles, is forthcoming from Duke University Press. Previous published books include Imaging Her Erotics—Essays, Interviews, Projects and More Than Meat Joy: Complete Performance Work and Selected Writings.

JANUARY 17 MARCELLA DURAND & ERICA HUNT
Marcella Durand is the author of AREA, Traffic & Weather, The Anatomy of Oil, Western Capital Rhapsodies, City of Ports, and Lapsus Linguae. For the past several years she has been translating Michèle Métail’s book-length work, Les horizons du sol/Earth’s Horizons. Erica Hunt is the author of Local History, Arcade, and Piece Logic. She is the president of the 21st Century Foundation.

JANUARY 24 TINA DARRAGH & LINH DINH
Tina Darragh’s essay “Blame Global Warming on Thoreau?” is included in the )((eco)(lang)(uage (reader)), forthcoming from Portable Press at Yo Yo Labs. A section of “Deep eco pre,” her collaboration with Marcella Durand, has been posted on How2. Darragh is happy to confirm the rumors that her opposable dumbs project is being plagiarized. Linh Dinh is the author of two collections of stories, Fake House and Blood and Soap; four books of poems, All Around What Empties Out, American Tatts, Borderless Bodies and Jam Alerts; and a novel, Love Like Hate, scheduled to be released in 2009 by Seven Stories Press.

JANUARY 31 WRITING ACROSS POETICS & VISUAL ART
Readings and presentations by poets and visual artists that speak across disciplinary boundaries.
Participants to be announced.

Shakespeare's Words--excellent online searchable glossary...





Looks like that slick patch of puffin puke Palin share's Cheney's love for Brutal, sadistic & unsporting hunting methods. My vocabulary fails me with these "people"--I wish I knew how to curse in Wolf...

Interesting too to see this newly empowered hatred of the natural world alongside the ongoing criminalization of bears in the local media--I'd be "aggressive" too if they built hideous suburbs on my mountain...


terrific story about Lil' Wayne & teaching in post-Katrina New Orleans--

"On one of his best songs, the super-catchy “I Feel Like Dying,” Lil Wayne barely exists. He always sounds high, but on this song he sounds as though he has already passed
out.


A lot of the alarmism about pop music sending the wrong message to impressionable youth seems mostly overwrought to me, but I’ll cop to feeling taken aback at ten-year-olds singing, “Only once the drugs are
done, do I feel like dying, I feel like dying.”



First time I heard a fifth grader singing this in falsetto, I said: “What did you say?”



He said: “Mr. Ramsey, you know you be listening to that song. Why you tripping?”



My students always ask me why I’m tripping at precisely the moments when the answer seems incredibly obvious to me..."





new & welcome blogger Dodie Bellamy has lots of nice pictures & report on the recent "Positions" conference...

check out the great Stan Getz soundtrack for Arthur Penn's beloved 1965 oddity "Mickey One"...

Thursday, September 11, 2008



Hush! Caution! Echoland! has two wonderful mixes to accompany Lewis Carrol's little-known classic--
"Fading, with the Night, the memory of a dead love, and the withered leaves of a blighted hope, and the sickly repinings and moody regrets that numb the best energies of the soul: and rising, broadening, rolling upward like a living flood, the manly resolve, and the dauntless will, and the heavenward gaze of faith--the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen!"

"Look Eastward! Aye, look Eastward!"

from: "Sylvie and Bruno" by Lewis Carroll, Chapter 25 (conclusion)

REBECCA BELMORE
MAKING ALWAYS WAR

Curated by Steven Tong


11 September - 11 October, 2008
Opening reception Thursday, 11 September, 2008, 6 - 9pm


CSA Space
#5 - 2414 Main Street
Vancouver, British Columbia
V5T 3E2
info@csaspace.ca

See Pulpfiction Books, 2422 Main Street, for keys and directions.

Wednesday, September 10, 2008






In The Street


"The Monte Clark Gallery is pleased to announce a solo exhibition entitled In the Street from Vancouver-based painter Alison Yip.


For her second solo exhibition at the Monte Clark Gallery in Vancouver, Yip exhibits paintings of her observations of street life in Vancouver, Hong Kong and Macau.


The new paintings are intimate in scale and continue Yip’s developing personal language of colour and light. The motives derive from the artist’s photographs
and sketches made in the street. Many of the figures are isolated, caught in a moment of reflection or an everyday action such as waiting for a bus or pausing to clean one’s glasses...

Like Fairfield Porter, Yip generalizes light and omits fine detail. Spatial relationships are constructed with carefully tuned colours and both figure and ground command equal presence. Observational rather than voyeuristic, her paintings depict the everyday but their primary subject is perception itself..."

Tuesday, September 09, 2008




Isola di Rifiuti reviews Kevin Davies' new book "The Golden Age of Paraphernalia"--

"It is the humor—self-deprecating, alert, winsomely falling into hints
of pathos unobstruct’d, vulnerable to humor’s obverse (which is
death)—that makes the book truly radiant. A glimpse of it here, in a
line or two I read as address’d (at least partially) to Ed Dorn: “The world / to come has come and gone, Ed. Do you have any idea how cheap memory / is now?”"

Monday, September 08, 2008




read the story of Benson, a Boston Terrier rescued from a puppy mill with untreated cataracts, and my remarkable young friend Sam Cummings of Tsawassen, who raised $500 towards the cost of a sight-restoring operation...



an all-time classic from a great blog--Bascom Lamar Lunsford - Smoky Mountain Ballads