I cleared the metal shed behind the house of a mountain of moldy junk. Someone in the congregation was in the habit of collecting tightly packed bundles of old wet newspapers, among other things. 

 

Bill & Micky, my heroes. Carpentry, plumbing, gas & electric, spiritual renewal : they can do it all. They brought so many tools that you could barely see the floor. We spent most of the week in the crawl space under the house. Before climbing under, Bill would yell : "Go on, snakes!" (water moccasins). But the only animals I saw all week were two cats. 

 

The kids from Vail, Colorado. 

 

Putting in a shower. 

the "shotgun house" we worked on. 3 resident Tulane students had to evacuate 4 days after arrival. We were renovating this to house 8-10 volunteers. (it was not really knocked on its side : I just can't seem to rotate the photo.) 

 

Carrollton St., on the way to Zimpel (& Chapel of the Holy Spirit, adjacent to Tulane campus) 

 

Fleeting glimpse of damage on the way in. 

 

Fog in MS. 

 

Crossing Lake Ponchartrain, N.O. in distance. 

 

In Mississippi a couple days later. Note damaged pines. 

Driving through Connecticut 

The profile on John Ashbery in this week's New Yorker.

I've said a lot of mean things about Ashbery, because he annoys me.

He looks so much like TS Eliot. Same bird type.

But I'll probably write a good essay on him one of these days, because his poetry had a mesmerizing effect on me, once upon a time, & I'm still intrigued by it all.

I note a lot of nostalgia in his writing, but maybe it's just my projection. I have a theory that the dialect of ordinariness, the overheard lingo, is actually a childhood memory of listening to his parents & grandparents talking.

Ashbery is doing a kind of sleep-prophecy, akin to Edgar Cayce. Purifying the mots of the tribu by channeling it through his tenderizer-hypno-voice.

Mississippi is to the Nile as New Orleans is to Alexandria.

This will be my first [physical] trip to Louisiana.

from The Grassblade Light:

 6


  
 Hallowed, evened out, Henry in the distance now,
 a mote in the delta.  Audacious love triangle
 twirls, treeless, on its own, an RI tangle –
 as dry leaves (spare delight) toward Salem go.

  
 Autumn lightning, hurricanes.  Then thunder.
 A Micmac, shadowy (through wormhole t-t-tuba)
 flows upstream – toward a salty spiral
 in the rubber barrel.  The spine goes under

  
 (buried sunflower).  Whose action is
 no stranger... pours forth from a window
 parallax – against complacency, woe,
 and violent paralysis.  Melchiz

  
 out of nowhere's whereabouts.  Stone
 vaults from mossy Mississippi lair –
 arrowheaded air headed your
 way, Hotspur Harry – your own

  
 land grant, swami saint – victorious
 viscous vapor eye!  Yours, the rube!
 Uppity now, mistletoed (up, stone tub!)
 Prance Petriarchy Pizzicat Nevarious,

  
 and regale them!  – all them,
 constant operator!  All them all together,
 veteran!  For the least fool measures
 the greeter amongst her – Miriam!

  
 Miracoloco!  Since Abraham Lincoln
 conned he was an Indian (check,
 by Jove) that showy Melchizedek
 has fibrillated nature's joy, my son –

  
 and though you rum from-toward the swine
 your pain of shame – run home again now!
 Earth hath need against this rage slow
 lights – lights, ghost!  For from brine

  
 of Superior comes your native wrestler,
 Jacob – as I sack your situation for a mini-
 millennial secular thanksdiver, honey:
 Massa saw!  A real Ur way trestler!

       
                          3.3.99

Josh stands up for weak poems against all comers.

As a perpetrator/survivor of the bruising listserve wars (Buffalo, Buffalo!) I can agree that online "critique" could get very warped. It probably shares the nervous testo-frenzy of internet behavior in general.

I also think that "micro" criticism could easily get very glib & superficial. Sometimes it takes many many readings (& side-research) to appreciate a poem.

Nevertheless, I think Josh is over-reacting. For one thing, it seems to me that Jeff Bahr is exaggerating the method in order to show how it works. But more importantly, I think this kind of analysis - hopefully offered in a sympathetic & generous manner - is very useful & necessary, if it comes from someone who knows what they're talking about.

How much bad writing gets high marks from supposed mentors - for certain strategic reasons, reasons which benefit the mentor, rather than the poet? (ie. trotting through a large percentage of mediocre & bad poems actually pays the bills for MFA teachers. & you don't want to make the students feel too bad; you don't want them to lose hope for their future niche in the industry, or even drop out of the program...)

But I don't want to turn this into a slam of CW teachers, not at all. As I say - if they know what they're doing, they're actually doing a service to literature.

"Poetry should be written fairly well." - Wm. Shakespeare

Have been gleaning a little more intelligence about my trip to N'Awlins, day after tomorrow. The house I'll be helping rehab is near Tulane U. It's off by itself. It has cracked doors, windows & floors. That's about the extent of my knowledge at this point. Hoping to learn more before I hit the road.

The Triptik I got from AAA has a little note : "I-10 and I-610 through New Orleans metro area are open, but only local residents with proper identification are allowed to exit." Sounds like they REALLY value their volunteers. If you don't hear from me after the 15th, I may be a Prisoner of Big Easy.

Sitemeter tells me that HG Poetics just passed Ron Silliman on total "hits" from domestic animals. 4 legs are better than 2 (sz Mr. Ed).

Blog-grazing has become increasingly popular among farm livestock & cattle drives, according to Melba the Cow. "Visits" can last anywhere from .25 seconds (called "nips") to all-night cud-chew contests.

For those dogs & cats out there who were wearied or distressed by the recent brouhaha (miaowaha) over at lime tree... here's how to tune out.

Now they just need a station to showcase the singing mice.

Mice Also Sing

yeah.

"To be persons, not scissors." - M. Paquin

old seasonal poem