Month: July 2015
[Disposable Poem July 23, 2015 – After Negativland]
In Memory of Negativland Higgledy-piggledy, Jiggery pokery, Scalia is God. Strict Constructivism is His pure applesauce. With niggardly wizardry, & history trickery, Scalia sticks pins In O’Connor’s briefs Wishing she’d die. His liturgy glittery From mystery misery, Scalia blasts Kennedy As a Roman Catholic Who trashed Evangelicals Bitterly hickory On civil liberty, Scalia damns … More[Disposable Poem July 23, 2015 – After Negativland]
Poetic Response: “Gojira / Godzilla, King of the Monsters” (1954) 96 Min. – Ishirō Honda – Japan
The biggest money-making blockbuster released from Toho Studios, director Ishirō Honda’s film has had a checkered past. The rights to the original “Gojira” were sold to Jewel Enterprises, Inc., where it was chopped up and reedited, with additional footage adding Raymond Burr, for mass marketing at American drive-in … MorePoetic Response: “Gojira / Godzilla, King of the Monsters” (1954) 96 Min. – Ishirō Honda – Japan
Poetic Response: Film “Barrio” (1998) 94 Min. – Fernando León de Aranoa – Spain
Barrío (1998) 94 Min Fernando León de Aranoa wrote and directed this Goya-award winning film that studies the lives of disaffected teenagers in Madrid, where high aspirations do not always lead to success. A stunning social critique of the lower middle-classes trapped by their economic conditions. The opacity of summer’s eye, … MorePoetic Response: Film “Barrio” (1998) 94 Min. – Fernando León de Aranoa – Spain
Poetic Response: Hymn to the Aesthetic Beauty Center – After Plastic Man – Comic – Jack Cole
Plastic Man’s Hymn to the Aesthetic Beauty Center Sexier than a sting ray in Bermuda, Flatulent yet strung out on raw ether, I flaunt my mutability to stay neuter With more ass than you’d care to remember. I lurk beside hoods and crooked dicks, Shoot craps and split the ambiguity, Shape shifting among schizophrenics, … MorePoetic Response: Hymn to the Aesthetic Beauty Center – After Plastic Man – Comic – Jack Cole
Poetic Response: Absinthe – After Erik Satie’s “Pièces Froides”
Absinthe Fastidious with his tea, Satie toys with a key — one key, one note learned by rote in the punctilious smoke of the infinite joke, drowned in the shuffles sawdust muffles of death rattles from memory’s tatters and tattle-tailers that gossip battles. Wistful melancholy in … MorePoetic Response: Absinthe – After Erik Satie’s “Pièces Froides”
Poetic Response: Epistrophy – After Thelonious Monk
Art work Copyright by Richard Day Epistrophy after Monk The mystery of you I forget the color of your eyes I forget the color of your hair I forget the color of your skin The mystery of you I can smell your body in the room I can feel my way in the dark … MorePoetic Response: Epistrophy – After Thelonious Monk
Poetic Response: “Ossos” (1997) 94 Min. – Pedro Costa – Portugal
Ossos (1997) Portuguese director Pedro Costa combines documentary and narrative styles to innovate what has come to be called “the cinema of stillness.” This film studies the Fontainhas district of Lisbon, where immigrants from Africa struggle to stay alive. I see your lips darkening the wall In city streets in … MorePoetic Response: “Ossos” (1997) 94 Min. – Pedro Costa – Portugal
Poetic Response: Art – This Jinni Can Juggle – Larry Broedow
This Jinni Can Juggle – Painting – Water Color on Board, with Silver Foil 40″ H x 30″ W The Fires of California The deaths pile up. Friends leave without anyone enjoying their art. The famous mingle with the unknown; a burn line protects no one. Is the Rancho Cucamonga studio still there? Whimsy and … MorePoetic Response: Art – This Jinni Can Juggle – Larry Broedow
Book Review: Marge Piercy – Made In Detroit – Poetry
MARGE PIERCY Made in Detroit Knopf, 2015. $27.95 Poetry is rarely celebrated for its bluntness, but Marge Piercy’s obsessions over the socioeconomic destruction of her childhood Detroit speak directly to an audience not of other poets, but of working-class citizens. The language is direct and clear, as Piercy catalogues the missing stores and businesses, … MoreBook Review: Marge Piercy – Made In Detroit – Poetry
Month: August 2015
Mistranslation: August 20, 2015: “Ai Qing to His Son” – Ai WeiWei
Ai Qing to His Son “You can fake the real. And you can fake the fake.” – … MoreMistranslation: August 20, 2015: “Ai Qing to His Son” – Ai WeiWei
Disposable Poem August 9, 2015 The Burn Line – After Terry Wright’s “Bad Faces: Little Hawk Remix 2015 “
According to General George Crook‘s notes, Little Hawk ” … appeared to rank next to Crazy Horse in importance, was much like his superior in size and build, but his face was more kindly in expression and he more fluent in speech; he did most of the talking.” –The Wikipedia Great Spirit The Burn … MoreDisposable Poem August 9, 2015 The Burn Line – After Terry Wright’s “Bad Faces: Little Hawk Remix 2015 “
Poetic Response: “Laika” – The First Dog in Space
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Disposable Poem August 8, 2015: Homage to Partch – After Harry Partch
Homage to Partch When you’re too poor to buy a horn, machete the tubing on the water hose and blow, as my brother did. Why should the rich monopolize music? Those of us who grew up where dodging bullets taught a new form of modern dance, professional drum sets were out of the question. … MoreDisposable Poem August 8, 2015: Homage to Partch – After Harry Partch
Poetic Response: “The Blob” (1958) 86 Min. – Irvin S. Yeaworth Jr.
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Disposable Poem August 2, 2015: No, I don’t Remember the Name of the Doctor – After Admittance to the Hot Springs National Park Medical Center
No, I don’t Remember the Name of the Doctor Dr. Kracken is rockin’ to Kitchen House Blues. Blind Willie screams for water but water will drown you. The Big Muddy’s your body now. Dr. Kracken is boppin’ between Dialysis machines, He’s tak’in down stats, text-messaging his concert manager, and talking to his wife. Dr. … MoreDisposable Poem August 2, 2015: No, I don’t Remember the Name of the Doctor – After Admittance to the Hot Springs National Park Medical Center
Month: September 2015
Poetic Response: Film – “Night of the Living Dead” (1968) 96 Min. George A. Romero
Night of the Living Dead (1968) The original and much scarier George Romero study of American social breakdown in a group who take refuge in a farmhouse from hordes of attacking zombies. Although their memories are going, they continue picking at each other’s food, assemble in the main lobby and watch whoever … MorePoetic Response: Film – “Night of the Living Dead” (1968) 96 Min. George A. Romero
Poetic Response: Shout Out for the Deacon – After James de Crescentis
Shout Out for the Deacon Bass woofers thrum a tsunami across the dance floor bodies electric hot-wired Afro Goth if the band’s loud enough bristles brazed they’ll kick the stops out wig-hat and all be the first ecstatic on death row to throw out the window a television set with its white noise demon placenta … MorePoetic Response: Shout Out for the Deacon – After James de Crescentis
Poetic Response: Nomadic Dream-Jumpers
Nomadic Dream-Jumpers They began chanting with both feet, wandering lands, marking by song where they have been. That became theirs wherever they could not stay, because nobody owned the earth until buried beneath it. Maps fixed arbitrary borders whose signs changed when feet stayed the same. They knew each other by different … MorePoetic Response: Nomadic Dream-Jumpers
Month: October 2015
Little Boots
Little Boots Little Boots so loved his gun And a lot of guns had he For he came from a line of Delta forces brave But it seemed that Little Boots Didn’t care what he would shoot He just loved the sound that rapid gunfire gave They named him Little Boots After … MoreLittle Boots
Eyes Without A Face (1960) Directed by Georges Franju
The Body Changes Without Any Warning Beneath the fractured skull, tectonic plates shift, Or so geological metaphors claim. … MoreEyes Without A Face (1960) Directed by Georges Franju
Homage to Poe: Halloween 2015
Homage to Poe Sauntering sonorous shoals, disinherited, disrespected, yet circumspectly attired, black cravat knotted tight, tilting along alluvial plains where so many died in that fratricidal war that copses still stink of corpses, decomposing filial plaint and hate into familial love, and haunt with smells of freshly baked bread the closet … MoreHomage to Poe: Halloween 2015
A Slight Mash-Up [from words by H. K. Stewart]
A Slight Mash-Up [stolen from some words by H. K. Stewart] No need to be afraid There will always be more All doors open wide Whence came you Hawk without wings No need to be afraid When it’s all taken away What’s not to sell All … MoreA Slight Mash-Up [from words by H. K. Stewart]
Mistranslation: Disposable Poem April 8, 2004 – “Watts up” After Ernie Watts
(For full experience press play on the vimeo video below poem text.) Watts Up Somebody better wire the pigeons before they deliver their secrets to the wise old men who run this country. Somebody better wire the pigeons before they turn into bluebirds without hamstrings in the fifty meter race. Somebody better wire the mockingbirds … MoreMistranslation: Disposable Poem April 8, 2004 – “Watts up” After Ernie Watts
Month: November 2015
Carbon Capture
Carbon Capture Carbon Engineering – Industrial-scale capture of CO2 from ambient air Otherworldly, luminous Membranes shudder and streak through From another dimension. Halos yellow into blue Horns apologists’ foreheads Bully kalashnikovs with. Those three magma, satellites Of voting rights, map dunes for Penile insertions of drones. In the beehive, Haute Couture … MoreCarbon Capture
The Last Time I Saw Paris/Sous le Ciel de Paris
The Last Time I Saw Paris/Sous le Ciel de Paris Source of the Enlightenment that inspired The American Revolution, it took a long time And many beheadings by the guillotine, before Anyone embraced Voltaire’s Traité sur la tolerance. It was why our founding fathers feared having a state religion. This is not … MoreThe Last Time I Saw Paris/Sous le Ciel de Paris
Marilyn Monroe’s Cats
Marilyn Monroe’s Cats They were all male, castrated, overly protective, crouching snarky as eunuchs guarding the harem. Named for each of her favorite husbands, [“For I knew in my depths that I wanted to disarm myself before the sources of my art, which were not in wife alone nor in family alone … MoreMarilyn Monroe’s Cats
Toy House
Toy House or why some children fear Birthdays This was where the talking alphabet Lay crippled by polio and dyslexia. For each holiday I would invent family Who knew exactly what to send: The black clown in whiteface that Kicked me off my tricycle and laughed; The nautical octopus whose tentacles Were hypodermics … MoreToy House
Burroughs for Thanksgiving
Burroughs for Thanksgiving If you teach them in your classroom, You should invite them for Thanksgiving dinner. All the writers whose work you require to be read Would finally have a good meal and company. Autistic Gertrude Stein, squat as Buddha. With snippy, bitchy Alice at her side Measuring and commenting on … MoreBurroughs for Thanksgiving
Nostradamus 2016
The poles will melt, waters raise tides, Planes will fall, planets collide. The house of the future is the shtetl of the past. A military coup settles the presidential caste. Face it: Facts aren’t sexy. Gossip clogs The Blogs, bleeding network slugs of static logs. Reporters yawn, how wide … MoreNostradamus 2016
Searcy Dog Killers
Searcy Dog Killers In woods of southern Searcy Terrorists are gunning for dogs. Mongrels, border collies, huskies, Malamutes, pugs, guidedogs, Pointers, Airedale Terriers, Pit bulls, hybrids, sheepdogs, Greyhounds, golden retrievers, English mastiffs, French bulldogs. Their entrails were left to rot … MoreSearcy Dog Killers
Dr. Niginsky
Dr. Niginsky (1974) 89 Min. Sergio Garrone directs Klaus Kinski in this Italian horror film with its deliberately misspelled title [aka, “La mano che nutre la morte,” aka, “The Hand That Feeds the Dead,” aka “Evil Force”]. Every time Kinski bites into a dolcetto, his hair frizzles brighter red and his nails and teeth grow. … MoreDr. Niginsky
Ghosts at Christmas
[Silent Night / Chet Baker & Christpher Mason] Ghosts at Christmas My grandmother will not go away. Years ago, she waited for the weekly Visit my mother and I would make After work. On the wall over her bed Hung a reproduction of “Blue Boy,” The one tactless possession that she kept As the room … MoreGhosts at Christmas
Assumptions Before the Feast
Assumptions Before the Feast Discourse. Cursive strikes Negative syllogisms From parallel worlds. Continuous rain Stains the dark with salty light. Beaded curtains chill. Power bristles quills Like a porcupine snubbed for Resembling a skunk. Empire comes, then goes. People cease to believe in The State and join tribes. The Black Sea trades subs … MoreAssumptions Before the Feast
The Black Garbo
The Black Garbo Nina Mae Back light turn you white And white’s way too tight. Nina Mae Whites don’t like color. Or sharing their power. Nina Mae Slay that “Dinah “ And steal Hallelujah! Call Harlem Seven-Seven-Eleven. See who still playin’ the dozens. Stereotype, all cotton is craps. Break to … MoreThe Black Garbo