The Rose Cafe: Love and War in Corsica

The Rose Café: Love and War in Corsica
By John Hanson Mitchell
Shoemaker & Hoard, $25.00, 243 pages
ISBN 978-1-59376-095-3

Review by Steve Glines

John Hanson Mitchell is a man on a permanent quest.

Go out to the wilderness and find out what you are made of. There is always seminal event that forms the body of a great man (or woman’s) character. For men it has often meant going off to war where the soul is stripped of the possessions of youth and reformed on the anvil of Thor. For most of us this transformation, if we have it at all, takes the form of a quest and there is a time-honored tradition of quest literature dating to antiquity.

For urbanized Americans youth this quest often involves Europe or another exotic location and if you are lucky, both. My daughter’s quest was orchestrated by her college, about the only thing about the place for which I am grateful. She was dropped in Aix en Provence in France with 24 classmates and instructed to walk, which they did for 4 months, camping by the side of the road as they went. She left America an angry, lost teenager and returned a driven adult determined to find her place in the universe. After 2 months on the road she called me from Syracuse in Sicily to announce her epiphany: She could be 30 and wish she had her architects license or she could be 30 and have her architects license but she was going to be 30 anyway. She came home and made the deans list.

My own quest took me to Nova Scotia and Newfoundland Canada where I hiked and hitchhiked for almost five months after High School. I slept in a fish-packing shed on the northern tip of Cape Breton Island where I cleaned fish and shoveled ice for a month for beer and food. When I grew restless I moved on to Newfoundland.

The harbor a small fishing port named Fortune was filled with half a dozen tramp steamers, Liberty Ships, left over from WWII. In the bar of the only restaurant in Fortune I met the captain of a ship that continuously made the circuit from Fortune to Iceland, Ireland, England, France, Africa, Bermuda, New York City, Halifax and back to Fortune. His ship and its predecessors had been making the run, with obvious interruptions, for almost 100 years. It was a three-month journey. I needed a passport. Did I know how to cook? Would I like the adventure? It paid Canadian minimum wage. It has bothered me ever since that I said no.

Later I was hitchhiking to another small port to catch a boat ride back to civilization. It was 9 pm. I looked at the map and realized my destination for the night was 25 miles down the dirt road in front of me. I walked all night through the fog, my flashlight useful only for illuminating the edge of the ditch. About 4 am the fog lifted and the first hint of daylight appeared in the sky. I walked up a steep hill, a switchback, climbing out of a deep dark valley. As I walked over the crest I saw the most beautiful sight I have ever seen: a ship, perhaps 300 feet long, with multi-colored lights draped from bow to stern, passing up through the rigging of the tramps crane and mast. The town itself was smaller, just ten or fifteen small pastel colored shacks. I walked onboard, found myself a bench and went to sleep. An hour after the boat left port the bursar found me. I paid for a ticket to Port-aux-Basque and went back to sleep.

For the next two days we drifted along the south shore of Newfoundland stopping at one village after another. At one village I got off to explore while the ship exchanged cargo. An entire town had moved from one side of a river to another to accommodate a larger pier. I asked a local what the cost of a house was there. He blinked at me in disbelief then said, “We have lots of houses here, pick one. We’ll outfit it for ya!” A foghorn lament announced the departure of the tramp so I hopped back onboard and watched the little village that would have welcomed me slide slowly into the mist. So many “what ifs.”

John Hanson Mitchell’s new book “The Rose Café” is the tale of a quest. He is a young student studying in Paris in the early 1960’s. He is bored and uninspired, in other words, a typical French student filled with ennui. He is both unable and uninterested in writing although he carries an empty notebook with him wherever he goes. A chance offer takes him to Corsica where he ingratiated himself with the owner of “The Rose Café” who offers him a job for the season cleaning fish and sweeping up for room and board. What follows is a wonderfully charming account of the local characters. Mitchell’s ability to delve into the characters of the local town is reminiscent of Dickens. The collection of characters is wonderful and we get a small town full: There is Le Baron, the aristocratic patron with a very shady background, the agonizingly French tease Marie and classic French lovers Jean-Paul and Micheline to name just a few.

Mitchell has always been adept at describing Place. His “Ceremonial Time” covers the details of one square mile of land in Littleton Massachusetts where living characters provide an anthropomorphic dimension to the geography. With “Living at the End of Time” he explores both eccentric people and the detail of his environment in a Waldenesque shack. We dig deeper into the quest experience with “Walking Towards Walden: A Pilgrimage in Search of Place” where “Place” still takes prominence. In Mitchell’s book “Looking for Mr. Gilbert: The Reimagined Life of an African American” we finally see what he can do with character development. Place is replaced by Character.

“The Rose Café” is the crescendo of Mitchell’s quest. While we get his usual treatment of the geography in intimate detail where necessary, it never overwhelms the characters that bring light to the scenery. The description of a dilapidated farmhouse surrounded by semi-wild donkeys is just enough to illuminate the eccentricities of the farmer/donkey herder who tells us fantastical stories about the locals. We get to know the people of Corsica and the arid scrub they inhabit through Mitchell’s eyes.

At the end of the tourist season Mitchell leaves Corsica and returns to school. In a final brilliant tease, Mitchell’s last sentence says more about Corsica, its society and his characters than all the rest of the book. It’s marvelous and you’ll put the book down after a good knee-slapping laugh.

When Mitchell left Corsica he began to write. His quest had only begun and we hope will never be over. A very charming book recommended to all.

Steve Glines/ Ibbetson Update/ April 2007

At the reception for Poetry Festival

( Photo courtesy of Elizabeth Doran)

Doug Holder/Dianne Robitaille at the reception for The Boston National Poetry Festival. http://tapestryofvoices.com

Hanging Loose 90

Hanging Loose 90. (231 Wyckoff St. Brooklyn, NY 11217) http://www.hangingloosepress.com/ $11

Mark Pawlak, who along with Somerville, Mass. resident Dick Lourie and Robert Hershon, is an editor of the venerable small press and literary magazine “Hanging Loose.” Pawlak sent me the latest issue of “Hanging Loose with a note steering me to his article concerning the late, celebrated Somerville poet Denise Levertov, and her husband Mitch Goldman. Pawlak met and was befriended by Levertov when he was a student at MIT in the late 60’s. Pawlak gives the reader a view of the poetic as well as the political life of Levertov, who was a dyed-in-the-wool civil rights and anti-war activist. Pawlak points out that Levertov distrusted formal education, and for the most part was an autodidact. Pawlak writes:

“Denise distrusted formal education, which she felt all too frequently resulted in mis-education.”

Pawlak reports that Levertov proved to be an endless font of wisdom about her craft. He writes:

“Denise admonished me: It was not worth my while, nor was it productive for me to keep struggling with one particular poem in an effort to get it ‘right.’ Sometimes you have to give it up—abandon it was the word she used… You have to move on and open yourself to new poems.”

Pawlak who is well-regarded both as an editor and a poet was told by Levertov not to become an editor:

“Denise professed to greatly value the work of magazine and press editors, admitting that she would find it hard to survive as a writer with out their efforts, but she nevertheless thought that to become one was the death knell for a poet. Denise believed in the primacy of the poet’s calling and jealously guarded her time to write.”

Also in this issue is some fine poetry. I greatly enjoyed the lead poem by Jack Anderson “As We Grow Old Together”

As We Grow Old Together

We do not mention it, ever,
yet every morning we study each other,
and although each of us surely suspects,
we say nothing about it,

yet every morning we study each other,
searching for any new and suspicious
never before noticed tremble or quaver;
without saying anything we watch what we do.

and when we start talking we track our words,
alert for any fresh memory collapse,
any phrase that unravels and trails off to no end
or runs headlong away, then limps into mumble,

and after we’ve carefully studied each other
we sigh with relief, happy to find
we can go on as before at least one day more,
so we say “Good morning” and give thanks it is good.

Highly Recommended.

Doug Holder/ Ibbetson Update

Former Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky to receive Ibbetson Street Press Lifetime Achievement Award in Nov. 2007

Former national Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky will be the recipient of the Ibbetson Street Press Lifetime Achievement award, as part of the "Somerville News Writers Festival" (Nov. 11 2007) to be held at Jimmy Tingle's Off Broadway Theatre in Davis Square, Somerville. Former winners were poets Robert K. Johnson, Jack Powers, former Grolier Poetry Book Shop owner Louisa Solano, and publisher David R. Godine, founder of "David R. Godine, Inc."

The (2007) "Somerville News Writers Festival" founded by Doug Holder and Tim Gager, will also include featured reader Tom Perrotta, poets: Sarah Hannah, Danielle Georges, Gloria Mindock and others to be announced. Over the last five years the festival has included such poets and writers as : Lan Samantha Chang, Franz Wright, Sue Miller, Steve Almond, Robert Olen Butler, Afaa Michael Weaver, Nick Flynn and
many others.

For more info go to http://somervillenewswritersfestival.com

Poet Michael Brown Brings His " Poetry Extravaganza" To Davis Square, Somerville.

Poet Michael Brown Brings His ‘Poetry Extravaganza’ To Davis Square


Well poetry month comes to the ‘ville April 22 at 7:30 PM at Jimmy Tingle’s Off Broadway Theatre when celebrated local poet Michael Brown brings his ‘Poetry Extravaganza’ to this Davis Square venue. Ten poets will make a return visit to the theatre as part of “Dr. Brown’s Traveling Poetry Show.” Such well- know slam and performance poets like: Doug Bishop, Jonathan Chin, Melissa Guillet, Valerie Lawson, Ryk McIntyre ,Tom Daley and Maia Radhakrishnan will relive their childhood memories, reinvent an eclectic collection of characters, rage against the machine, throw barbs at the nattering nabobs of negativism, etc… in this unique showcase. This performance piece is directed by Brown. Brown is the author of four books of poetry, a national slam finalist, a PhD, and is known for bringing the poetry slam to Boston from his native Chicago through his venue at the Cantab Lounge in Cambridge, Mass. that he had hosted for 13 years.


Part two of the program will be hosted by SlamMaster Simone Beaubien. Beaubien took over the Cantab Slam venue for Brown, and the general consensus is that she reinvigorated this celebrated series. Beaubien will direct the “Boston Poetry Slam” part of the “Extravaganza” in which six all-star local poets, selected from Boston’s slam community will compete for the attention of a hopefully animated audience, and the discerning judges. I spoke with Brown recently about his latest project.




Doug Holder: First off "Dr. Brown's Traveling Poetry Show" is a performance poetry show. Isn't all spoken word performance to some extent?

Mike Brown: Sure, all spoken word is performance, but certainly not all poetry presented orally is performance. In fact it has taken quite a while for some poets who do readings to realize how badly they do that. I suspect some will continue reading badly to set themselves apart from spoken word. What we seek with the Dr Brown’s show is to affect the audience with the immediacy of art.You have ten poets in this show.

DH: How do you blend their styles into a cohesive performance piece?

MB: Each show is different. We may do themed shows, such as political, comic, love stories, or Disney-connected poems, for example. But most of our shows are themed based on what the poets want to do at the time. A few days before each show I have the participants e-mail me the titles of the poems (including last lines) they would like to do. I arrange those in a set list. At its simplest, the set list progresses by association, so that one poem follows another. I don’t necessarily try to blend their styles. Each voice is unique and contrast has more value than closeness. Since we perform throughout the room, we try to have poets start at a distance from the previous poem. That facilitates contrast.

DH: Can you talk about some of the featured poets?

MB: I can talk about many of the poets, but not for print. Bada bing!

Mala Radhakrishnan is probably the best example of what this group can do. A Ph.D. candidate in chemistry at MIT, she plays piano and does half a dozen other interesting things. When we first met, she thought her poetry had a limited shelf life because, while witty, it was all about chemistry. She has found that audiences like that. At the same time, she has expanded what she writes about.

At his best, Ryk McIntyre is a great audience favorite. At his worst he can scare whole rooms full of people. Other than myself, he has probably been doing this longer than anyone in our group. Ryk’s wife, Melissa Guillet brings an ethereal and musical grace to what we do.

Douglas Bishop is also a seasoned performer and producer of many group shows. The lyrical quality of his work is unsurpassed.

Tom Daley, like his famous sister Katie, has a great facility with characters and voices, pastoral wit, and keen imagery.

Valerie Lawson is a mainstay, one of those solid mid-group poets with a great range of material—Duchamp, women’s hockey, love and peace. If we were a relay team, she would be the anchor.

Jeff Taylor is the wackiest one in our group. If it has to do with weird people (a guy afraid of cheese), a strange take on politics (Bush’s motivational switches), or late night, drug-induced comedy, it’s Jeff’s.

Jonathan Chin is our newest, a BU student seriously dedicated to poetry whose voice grows with each show.

Melissa Bates is probably has the greatest difficulty performing. We all find memorization difficult, and she finds it agony to stand in front of an audience and deliver. But she pitches women’s softball, so she knows how to stay in there.

Michael Mack is the opposite. He probably has least difficulty with memorization and is the most comfortable with performance. That does not mean he is the best performer. As I always say in workshops, “If you are not nervous about this, you don’t know what you are doing.” Michael knows, but he does this so much, he can get blasé.

DH: The second part of the show will be hosted by SlamMaster Simone Beaubien. Can you define Slam for the uninformed? Who will be featured in this part of the program?

MB: Slam is a competition in which poets are judged Olympic-style on content and performance. Simone has promised to bring the best six poets from the current stable at the Cantab Lounge, but she won’t say who they are, and I can’t force Simone to do anything she does not want to do.

DH: Is performance and slam poetry well-represented around the country for poetry month?

MB: Yes, but…. I first heard from Marge Piercy that poetry month was an invention of publishers and booksellers to profit from the resurgence of interest in poetry. The problem is that, while much of that interest has been fueled by performance poetry, publishers are not looking to put out books by performance poets. Peter Davison, longtime poetry editor for The Atlantic pointed out that performance poetry was having a positive effect on poetry readings. Audiences no longer tolerated being held captive by very bad readers. Those who make a distinction between performance poetry and page poetry now book performance poets to enliven otherwise dull readings by name page poets, especially during poetry month. I defer to Goethe: “Comparisons are odious.” If you don’t think performance poetry is real poetry, I’ll bet you $15. Come to our show. At the end of the evening, if you want your money back, see me.
Doug Holder

For tickets go to http://www.jtoffbroadway.com/

Review of "On the Line" by Don Winter

On The Line
By Don Winter
2006; 14pp; BoneWorld Publishing,
3700 County Route 24,
Russell, NY 13684. $4.

Reviewed By Michael Kriesel

Winter’s 1st chapbook (also by BoneWorld) had greater depth and range of subject matter. But there are gems here, especially the fast food worker poems. “My first real wage job was at the Niles, MI, Burger Chef,” Don said in an online interview. “I had burger production ingrained into me, position by position: food preparer, cashier, even hostess (no joke)…all the way up to night manager. The battle to somehow live a voluntary, purposive life in that kind of world is reflected in those poems.”

Winter brings grace to his subjects. Here’s the first half of “The Tacoma Tavern.”
“is drunk with rain. / And our tables are careless / with empty bottles, cigarette ash. / And we run our fevers / up over a hundred / arm wrestling our motorcycle buddies, / drinking pitchers on one breath / for a dollar. And we try to drink enough / to lose our names. / And we make up stories to fit / the bad things, by turns hero and victim. / And the waitress acts vaguely in love / with each man.”

His other gift is an ability to speak for the ones at the bottom. “us…good for nothings, wrong / since Genesis.” Those fucked by “factories everywhere / slamming shut like empty cash drawers.”

“I love, and have been influenced by, the poetry of Thomas McGrath,” Winter explained. “He was educated, brilliant, and famous, but had the guts to write poems from the position of the working class poor, from that life and that labor being economically exploited, even though the academics hated him for it, and threw him out for it.”

Perhaps inspired by McGrath, who’s known for his epic “Letter To An Imaginary Friend,” Winter tries a longer poem (7 pages) in this chapbook. He’s also been recently writing short, haiku-ish pieces. I hope he keeps trying new things. He’s one of the best poets in small press…and the one with the most undeveloped potential. His bio notes mention how before a 1998 divorce reduced him to poverty, Winter owned Southeast Real Estate. Worked 16-hour days. Drove 100 mph in his sports car. “Carried a revolver in the front pocket of my leather duster, and lived in a custom-built home on Lake Tuscaloosa.”

More recently, he attended college at the University of Anchorage, serving as assistant editor of the Alaska Quarterly. Currently, Don’s one of the editors of the zine “Fight These Bastards.” And he’s back in Michigan, taking care of elderly parents. His mom and dad both have cancer.
Here’s hoping Don begins to write about these other lives, somewhere down the line.

Review of "Some Global Positioning Dharma" Richard Krech

Krech (left) Thurston Moore (Right)

Some Global Positioning Dharma Richard Krech (Round Barn Press 945 Kains Ave Albany, CA. 94706)

This is a book of simple poems that speak of balance, harmony, and the eternal. They remind of me of the still sheet of some isolated pond that is slightly broken by a stone cast on its waters.
So it follows Krech has a poem “Art Therapy”: “To paint the big picture/ w/exquisite detail/ &economy of words. / No easy task. I choose/ to break off smaller chunks/ & make what I can
of them. / throwing pebbles in a pond.”

And here is a well-rendered picture of the simple beauty of a meal eaten over the Bay of Tangiers: “Ramadan Evening (Tangiers 1989)”:

I see people sitting at tables
looking over the By of Tangiers
hot steam rising
from their bowls.

Poised/ Time Suspends/ Sky Darkens.
The muezzin cries.

After giving thanks
they eat.

A fine collection of quiet, calming and crafted poetry by Richard Krech.

Doug Holder/ Ibbetson Update


for more on the author go to http://www.verdantpress.com/krech.html

Interview with Poet Ellaraine Lockie with Pablo Teasdale

Interview with Poet Ellaraine Lockie

By: Pablo Teasdale


Pablo: I'm very glad for the opportunity of interviewing you, Ellaraine. Your audience is rapidly growing, and I'm not the only one who wants to know how you think. So. . . Femininity is very evident and strong in your poems. Could you please express how your beauty and femininity translate into thought and word?

Ellaraine: Thank you, Pablo, for doing the interview. I'm smiling at this first question. The last person who bought a copy of my chapbook, Finishing Lines, was a woman medical doctor from Russia who is well-read in poetry. She said after reading it, "You write like a man."
And the judge of the recent Elizabeth Curry Award from SLAB at the University of Slippery Rock, in writing the analysis of the winning poem (which was mine), referred to the poet throughout as "he." (The contest entries were anonymous.) I think this was because the poem reflected a realistic look at Montana farm life, and it also used the word "bullshit."
But okay, two of my collections (Midlife Muse and Crossing the Center Line) have dealt with a most feminine issue--that of menopause. The poems in them have struck a cord with many women because I openly address experiences that they are either too embarrassed to talk about or sometimes even to think about. And I have quite a few poems about sexuality, one collection in particular about illicit love affairs (Coloring Outside the Lines). Another in progress is a collection on electronic love. These are all written from a woman's viewpoint, either my own or others', mostly women's.
I feel more qualified to write from a woman's stance for the obvious reason. When I do so, as I do with every poem, I try to strip the layers away of whatever subject I'm addressing until I'm down to the core of it. This requires an unflinching look and a willingness to write what I find there, no matter what is revealed. These are truths as I either experience them or observe them. That's what poetry should do I believe--deliver the truth. And I do think that the truth is perhaps harder to communicate sometimes for women, especially of my generation. We were brought up not to say the word fuck, for instance, when men said it all the time. But there are scenarios that can only be described by using the word. I have a poem, in fact, about how my daughters taught me that it was okay to use it. It's a very effective word, as long as it's used sparingly.

Pablo: How do you define truth in poetry? How factual are your truths?

Ellaraine: Poetry by definition is creative writing. Many poets and readers forget that and put poetry in a memoir or diary category. In the workshop that I teach, "From Picture Books to Poetry," I've started having students write "lies" just to get them feeling comfortable with the creative aspect of poetry, because sometimes we have to write non-factually, either to get at core truths or to make our poems the best they can be. The term "poetic license" didn't become cliché for nothing.
For me, the excellence of the poem is the only criteria for honesty. Of course I'm not advocating telling lies about particular people in poems. In fact, that's one of the great things about creative writing--being able to change say, from first person to third person at will, thus protecting everyone's privacy--including my own. I often write someone else's experience in first person and my own in third person. Also, many of my poems are composite poems--ones that utilize multiple people and/or experiences but then tie them all together in one voice. And I never tell which poems, or which parts of a poem, are factual. It's a question I get often at readings, and I have to clamp my mouth shut in order to avoid giving a lecture.
Sometimes, too, poems inherently demand deviations from facts in order to read musically or to follow a particular form. And what difference does it make if a dress is red instead of blue or if the experiences in the poem really happened to five people instead of one? The only thing that matters is that the poem reads true, and the readers will know when it does.

Pablo: Do you have any expressible thoughts regarding writers (and poets in particular) using opposite gender pen names or about the use of pen names in general?

Ellaraine: Oh, for sure I do. First of all, pen names no matter what gender, are great fun, and they have a way of becoming alter egos. For instance, I often use mine in public. Everyone at the local Starbucks where I write every morning knows me as the first name of one of my pen names. (It's so much easier to remember than Ellaraine.) And let's face it, there are times in life that maybe we don't want to use our real name.
Writing-wise, having pen names has allowed me to get poems published that wouldn't be copasetic with the image of a children's picture book writer, a market that I wish to enter. Publishers aren't likely to want a picture book writer, at least until she/he is established in the picture book market, to be known for sometimes writing sexually explicit poetry. This type of conflict of interest is all the more relevant because of the Internet.
I've also found the made-up names to be handy in protecting others' privacy. For instance, I just wrote a poem about an experience my daughter had touring Europe as a member of a fairly famous rock band. To use my name, the last of which is also her name, would identify her and this band. She would be furious, and I wouldn't blame her.
Then sometimes we poets just want to pursue several different styles of writing, and for me it works to have different personas holding the pen. Oh yes, and it intrigues a fair percentage of editors/publishers. One of my pens has an ongoing correspondence with one of my editor's pen names. It's belly-laughing hilarious.
I have three pen names. The first one originated back when I was first writing children's picture book manuscripts. I'd sent seven, one at a time as they were rejected, to a certain publisher when she wrote back and told me not to submit any more. I was green then as a writer, and this upset me terribly because I felt that all of my children's stories were vastly different from one another, and I had several more to send. So I made up a name, used a friend's address and sent the rest. She didn't take one, but at least I had the satisfaction of knowing they were read.
Now I tell all perspective editors in my submission letters when I'm using a pen name. That's the right thing to do, and the right thing for them to do is to protect my privacy, which they've always honored.
My two additional pen personalities were born when I wanted to enter twelve poems in a contest with a theme, but the publisher's rule was one entry of three poems per poet. So I wrote and asked if three pen names could each enter three poems in addition to mine (paying of course the entry fees for all entries.) The answer was yes, and subsequently all but one of us were published in the winners' anthology.
And did I mention the romance or mystique of having a made-up name or two?

Pablo: Now I thought we'd deviate from the usual interview questions and go a little deeper. Let's start with this one: Why are men still ruling and running the planet?

Ellaraine: Brute force. In the end, after all discussion about women's rights and equal opportunities, men are still physically more powerful than women. In many parts of the world men are legally allowed to use physical force against women--to go even as far as killing them. And in parts of the world where it isn't legal, it still not only happens, but the fact and the threat often stand between the sexes as an unconscious force that influences not only relationships but community, state, national and international policies.

Pablo: How are you affected by your dreaming life?

Ellaraine: I love having dreams--even the nightmarish ones, because they mean that I've been able to get into a deep sleep. I've battled insomnia for twelve years and have tried every remedy out there, I think, including two extensive stays at the Stanford Sleep Clinic.
Before that, most dreams seemed like a continuation of my life, some euphoric and some horrendous but most rather day-to-day-like. I've never spent much time analyzing them, but one particular and reoccurring dream fascinates me enough that I recently wrote a poem about it. It involves flying, or perhaps floating in the air above every earthly thing. I'm often in the form of an eagle. This is an incredibly happy experience and leads me to suspect that I've either been an eagle or that I will be one eventually. The closest awake feeling to this that I've ever had is when I do Tai Chi, where I sometimes feel like I'm floating through clouds. I didn't reach that state until I'd practiced Tai Chi for fifteen-plus years.

Pablo: I find it more and more difficult to think of God in terms of gender. I won't elaborate. What would your thoughts be on this?

Ellaraine: I stopped thinking of God as a kind-looking man with a beard when I stopped attending church after I left home for college. God, for me, rather has evolved into a force. I find this force in everything--people, animals, trees, rocks, the earth itself. It's all connected. Nothing affirmed this more for me than attending a writers' retreat called "Writing the World" two years ago in the Sonoran Desert with Harvey Stanbrough at the helm. Harvey is one of my poetry mentors. I'd like to add one of the resulting poems from his retreat at the end of this interview if there is space. I think if we all adhered to what Harvey teaches in this retreat, there wouldn't be any more wars. I wish its attendance were required for all world leaders.

Pablo: For this question I must loosely paraphrase the poet William Everson. He believed that there was a "mantle" the poet could put on (if it fit) that endowed the poet with authority and that this was not to be taken lightly. What are your thoughts on this?

Ellaraine: I'm not familiar with William Everson or his stance on this subject, but my definition of a powerful poem is generally one that is written by someone who comes across as an authority on that which she/he has written. Fakes usually can't pull off a good poem; the mantle just isn't going to fit.
As for a poet having this kind of authority, who better to have it other than a person who is committed to write truth? Is there responsibility on the part of the poet? Tremendous, but it's to the poet him/herself. Readers are free to choose the impact the poem has on them.

Pablo: If a complete stranger were to trust her infant to you to nurture until the child was three years old, what single thing would you feel was most important for that child?

Ellaraine: Security, in all it's facets: To be fed when hungry, to have its thirst quenched, to be physically held and emotionally nurtured, to be kept as safe and pain-free as possible and to be taught that someone loves it enough to enforce gentle, consistent and nonviolent discipline when the age/stage requires it.

Pablo: What in your opinion is the biggest source of trouble in the world today and what do you think can realistically be done about it?

Ellaraine: I don't think there's any all-encompassing answer to this; the questions are much too complex for the space I have, not only on paper but in my mind.
I've been lucky enough to travel extensively, and the happiest people I've encountered are perhaps those in cultures that put the least emphasis on material things that money can buy and who put a big emphasis on family and community. It seems to me that status quo gets out of kilter, even in these societies, when part of the people get overly greedy--for things, money or power.
What to do about it? I might know more about what not to do about it, and that's not to force one's government or religion on other countries or cultures that have functioned in their own ways since the beginning of time. (I believe this comes under the "power" part of greed.) Of course, we could try to send everyone to Harvey's "Writing the World" retreat; but there I go, trying to push my own beliefs on others.

Pablo: Imagine with me please. If you were marooned on a remote island with two strangers. . . a world class female athlete and a female astrophysicist, what synthesis of thought might the three of you produce?

Ellaraine: Boy, you weren't kidding when you said we were going to skip the usual questions and go a little deeper. This is about the strangest question anyone has ever asked me.
Okay. I know a bit about survival, not from fighting for it myself but from hearing about it through those close to me who did: my parents and grandparents, who homesteaded on the Montana prairie in the late 1800s. And that's what we're talking about here--survival.
My grandparents, when they were dependent upon the land for their livelihood, had little time to synthesize their thoughts in any way that didn't involve feeding and clothing themselves and their families.
And that's what the three of us marooned on a remote island would be strategizing too. The thought of it makes me squirm with how little I'd be able to contribute--perhaps the spinning of yarn from wild animals that the athlete would capture and then the knitting of those yarns into warmth to cover with and wear for insulation from exposure. I could make paper out of natural fibers, one of my true craft talents, and sew clothes from the bark of trees.
I would likely be the one to do the killing for food after the athlete hunted down the animals. I can mercy-kill, again as a result of growing up in Montana, so I could kill to stay alive. I might be able to make a fire from two sticks of wood, as a result of an excellent demonstration in a Masai village in Kenya recently.
As for the astrophysicist's contribution, she'd probably entertain us at night with her extensive knowledge, as we lie gazing at the stars. I could fictionalize and poetize what she said and record it using natural plant dyes on the handmade papers. Eventually, we'd probably discuss lesbianism.

Pablo: The world is ending tomorrow at noon. What will you do between now and then?

Ellaraine: I'll gather up my family and anyone we love who chooses to come, and we'll cook and eat a last meal together, incorporating everyone's favorite foods and wines. (Mine will be popcorn, any Caparone wine, homemade bread and Ben and Jerry's Coffee Heathbar Crunch Ice Cream.) Then we'll make music together. (My family is very musical.) Then we'll break into privacy, with partners or vibrators or magazines or whatever works, for a final sexual encounter. Lastly, we'll all hold hands, tell stories about each other as though we were attending our own funerals, and then we'd vow to meet in our afterlives.
Of course, this is all idealized. Maybe I'll just be immobilized by fear of pain and death or crazy in anguish that children and grandchildren, all of them all over, won't have a chance to live full lives. Who really knows how any of us will react in outrageous situations?
­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­_______________________________________




Ellaraine writes poetry, nonfiction books, magazine articles/columns and children's stories. She is a well-published and awarded poet who has received ten nominations for Pushcart Prizes in poetry and has three published chapbooks: Midlife Muse, Poetry Forum, Crossing the Center Line, Sweet Annie Press and Coloring Outside the Lines, The Plowman Press. She also teaches school and community poetry workshops.
Her nonfiction books are All Because of a Button: Folklore, Fact and Fiction, St. Johann Press; The Gourmet Paper Maker, Creative Publishing, and The Low Lactose Kitchen Companion and Cookbook forthcoming in 2007.
Ellaraine has recently been to Kenya on a poetry fellowship and to Centrum in Port Townsend, WA, for a poetry residency. She has just received the Elizabeth Curry Award from SLAB at the University of Slippery Rock in PA. Forthcoming is a chaplet, Roadtrip, from the Rooftop Chaplet series and a chapbook, Blue Ribbons at the County Fair, from PWJ Publishing.
_______________________________________



Writers' Retreat

. . . observe the things that were and watch them pass, not rushing them along nor holding them too tightly.-- Great Expectations, Harvey Stanbrough

He speaks of writing the world
Of sensing the wholeness first
While we sit on hay bales
Pens in hand
Near the edge of an Arizona night
Our mentor encircles the gift of knowledge

His words unwrap it
Ribbons of preconceptions
fall to the Sonoran floor
Sharp observations cut away the clothes
that seam our separateness
from sand, saguaro, hawk
grasshopper and sunset

He casts a last ray of sun
on the continuous web
that weaves us all together
The spider who snares a butterfly
in a creosote bush
Whose seeds feed a kangaroo rat
The two toads who have enrolled in the retreat
And me watching a beetle spin in circles
fighting its own fading light
on a picnic table just out of reach

We're all related says our mentor
Cousin Coyote, grandfather owl
His words soft now in the silk of night
Brother beetle has flipped onto his back
Legs beating against the darkness
His dirge in baritone buzz
is steel wool that scours the sage's waxed words

While the other listeners lean into enlightenment
I curl up in confusion's shadow
Words of patience and intimate observation
waft by in the grey zone
The buzz is bright white and the beat of legs blinding
I want to yank that connecting web
Hang the beetle with Hemlock Society blessing
But I wedge my hands and their traitorous twitch
between butt and hay bale

Our mentor's final message for the evening
comes on sound waves so round and full
they overflow the soul with ancestral memories
And of the branch from which the flute was formed
Even the beetle is silent
But suddenly propelled by unexplained energy
onto the plate of leftover vegetable wraps
landing up-side down and mute
His legs still moving

The man of wisdom and music sits down as I leap up
Sledge a book of poetry onto the plate
The web snaps like a rubber band
and the entire Sonoran Desert winces
But I'm the one with the welt
that stings and reddens my cheek

_______________________________________

Pablo Teasdale’s first interview was with Raquel Welch when he was a sailor and she was a new star. Since then, he has interviewed many artists formally and informally. . . both well-know and unknown. Among the notables: Anais Nin, Bob Hope, Lyn Lifshin, James Leo Herlihy and Brian Morissey. His drawings have been published in the U. S. A. and Germany. His synthesizer compositions are used by poets and dancers in live and broadcast productions internationally. Teasdale has been the subject of four documentaries and lives in Santa Cruz, California. He is currently writing a memoir titled, "Let Me Tell You About My Redundancy Again."

Somerville Poets Will Be Well-Represented at the Boston National Poetry Festival

SOMERVILLE POETS WILL BE WELL- REPRESENTED AT THE BOSTON NATIONAL POETRY FESTIVAL

A highlight of April/ Poetry Month is the Boston National Poetry Month Festival that for the last seven years has been held at the Boston Public Library (Copley Square). This brainchild of poet Harris Gardner will be held April 14 to 15 this year. Among the over fifty readers there will be several accomplished Somerville Poets who will make their appearance on the stage. Afaa Michael Weaver, whose work was recently featured in Poetry magazine, Gloria Mindock, the founder of the Cervena Barva Press, Tim Gager, the co-founder of the Somerville News Writers Festival, and Lloyd Schwartz, U/Mass Boston English Professor, C. D. Collins, as well as yours truly, Doug Holder, will strut their poetic stuff. Every festival includes an open mike if you are brave enough to read your own work, and a book table with books ready to be signed by the featured readers.

Every year at the festival I have hosted, read, and manned the book table. During this time I have met an incredible array of poets of all stripes: including: X.J. Kennedy, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Franz Wright, as well as well-known and lesser- known regional poets. This year the festival will include former National Poet-Laureate Maxine Kumin. I can’t think think of any event of its kind that attracts so many folks from the academic, non-academic, Slam, and traditional spoken word schools or venues. If you are new to the community and want to familiarize yourself with the scene, or if you have been away awhile and want to have a reunion of sorts, or if you simply want to be the proverbial fly-on-the-wall, then this event is exactly what the doctored ordered.



For more information go to: http:www.tapestryofvoices.com or call 617- 306-9484.

Former Grolier Owner will read from her favorite poems at Newton Free Library!

FORMER OWNER OF FAMED GROLIER POETRY BOOK SHOP TO READ POETRY FROM HER
FAVORITE POETRY PATRONS!

Newton Free Library 330 Homer St. Newton, Mass. April 10 7PM



The Annual Poetry Festival Features Martha Collins, Louisa Solano, Joan Houlihan & Open Mike
In honor of National Poetry Month, the Library will present its 34th Annual Evening of Poetry, sponsored by the Friends of the Library. Martha Collins, Louisa Solano ( former owner of the Grolier Poetry Book Shop in Harvard Square) and Joan Houlihan will read on Tuesday, April 10, 7:00PM, followed by an Open Mike with a one-poem/ person limit. Refreshments will be served.

This festival and the year-long series are coordinated by Doug Holder, publisher of Ibbetson Street Press.

Collins is the author of a book-length poem, Blue Front, as well as four other books of poetry: Some Things Words Can Do, A History of a Small Life on a Windy Planet, The Arrangement of Space, winner of the Peregrine Smith Poetry Competition and The Catastrophe of Rainbows. She has also edited a volume on Louise Bogan and co-translated two collections of poems from the Vietnamese, The Women Carry River Water by Nguyen Quang Thieu and Green Rice by Lam Thi My Da. In Blue Front, Collins dissects a horrific lynching that occurred in her hometown when she was a child. Booklist, writes: “Collins employs a staccato, matter-of-fact tone that strikes like a sledgehammer at persistent, if hidden, hate. More than worthy as poetry, Blue Front is also a powerful statement about America and a potent reminder of humankind’s terrible potential.”

Solano owned the Grolier Poetry Bookstore from 1974 until 2006 when she retired. Virtually everyone in modern American letters came through the Grolier’s doors in Harvard Square. Founded in 1927 by Adrian Gambet and Gordon Cairnie, it is the “oldest continuous book shop” devoted solely to the sale of poetry and poetry criticism. Solano, a 1966 graduate of Boston University and bookstore habitué since 1955, took over operation of the store after Cairnie’s death. She will read from her favorite patrons’ poems.

Houlihan is the author of Hand Held Executions and winner of the Green Rose Award from New Issues Press for The Mending Worm. She writes “Boston Comment,” a series of essays that focuses on contemporary American poetry and appears regularly on Web del Sol. Founding director of the Concord Poetry Center, she is editor-in-chief of Perihelion and senior poetry editor of Del Sol Review.

Advanced Praise for "Of All The Meals I Had Before..." and "No One Dies at the Au Bon Pain" by Doug Holder

(Doug Holder)

I will have poetry collections released by http://sunnyoutside.com and the http://www.cervenabarvapress.com in April and May 2007. Here is some advanced commentary:

"No One Dies At The Au Bon Pain" ( http://www.sunnyoutside.com)

Bones and humanity--reflections and stone- passion and tears from a glass eye... Inside, upon these pages you'll find Doug Holder has strapped you upon his back and has taken you for a ride in mortality... and beyond...these poems are poignant paintings of life and the depth its decades imprint upon a man's soul and the catacombs of its joy and pain. This one of his best works yet."

Jennifer Matthews/ author of "Fairytales and Midemeanors" http://www.jennifermatthews.com

" Doug Holder's poems take you on a dream mind ride with the common moments and things in life. The images and angles of thought and language are at once familiar and plain and odd. They are the dreams of dreams you think you remember, the thoughts you had before you remember something. They are flashes of insight and snapshots of time, and place and humanity. The poems have the sense you feel when you have an idea for a poem just before falling asleep and you say you'll write it down in the morning, but it drifts into dreamland and you forget. Reading the poems of Doug Holder, you feel as though you remember that great poem you forgot."

Dan Sklar/ Head of Creative Writing/ Endicott College

"With confidence and ocassional flashes of humor, these are poems ( lamentations/ meditations) on what was, is, and ultimately will be. They are strong and unapologetic in both their rage and acceptance, offering up a clear view of the truth--that no one gets out of here alive."

Gloria Mindock/ Cervena Barva Press http://www.cervenabarvapress.com

"Doug Holder's poems from his new collection NO ONE DIES AT THE AU BON PAIN are psychological studies delivered in spare, elegant lines. Though often located in the most quotidian of settings, they explore the heights and depths of the human soul. And when we, as readers, find hm standing before the mirror in the public restroom, we look up to find the visage reflected is our own."

Richard Wilhelm/ Arts/ Editor Ibbetson Street Press

"This book is a gift, the silhouette of restlessness as Holder studies the way things end and sees there is no real ending. He celebrates " ... a standing chant, a prayer for the common man." Holder understands compassion as generosity in tender poems carved from the quickened wood of the moment."

Afaa Michael Weaver/ Professor of English/ Simmons College / Boston

"Of All The Meals I Had Before..." ( Cervena Barva Press)

"Some poems make you hungry, and some poems want to make you throw up. These food poems are served up spicy like Italian cuisine. Read them before dinner or after desert, either way like Chinese food, you'll be hungry for more."

A. D. Winans

"A delightful and delicious collection of poems, whetting the appetite for more. These are the kinds of witty, Jewishy poems I envision Woody Allen would write, should he ever take to writing poetry. "

Helen Bar-Lev, Artist, PoetEditor-in-Chief Voices Israel Anthology
author: Animals are Nature's Poetry
co-author: Cyclamens and Swords and other poems about Israel

Praise for "Wrestling With My Father"

Robert Olen Butler (Pulitzer Prize Winner- "A Good Scent From A Strange Mountain") commenting on Holder's collection of poetry: "Wrestling With My Father:" "I’ve been greatly enjoying your poems. You have a major league talent, man."

Martha Collins ( Professor of Creative Writing-Oberlin College, and author of "Blue Front," (Gray Wolf Press) commenting on "Wrestling With My Father.":--so I did get this, at Porter Square, (Books) and found it wonderfully moving. My one and only chapbook is about my mother in her final years: more about those years than, as in yours, a whole life with a parent--but the emotions surrounding parental loss are near and dear to my heart. Thanks for heading me that way."

In the Soho at Poets House

Well I am back from the Poet's House showcase in New York City. This is the last year it is going to be held in the SOHO section of Manhattan. This poetry center, with 45,000 volumes of poetry, will be moving in 2008 to Battery Park City. While there I spoke to a number of folks, including Donald Lev the publisher of the "Home Planet News" http://www.homeplanetnews.org, poet Stanley H. Barkan , publisher of the "Cross-Cultural Review Series of World Literature and Art in Sound, Print and Media," Lee Bricetti, the director of Poets House http://www.poetshouse.org among others.

I also met an English banker who regularly reads in venues on the Bowery,an elderly poet from France who kept asking me the difference between "there" and "here," a poetry lover who produces a show on Manhattan Cable Access TV and other interesting characters!I also looked at all the new poetry books on display. Fortunately or unfortunately Ibbetson Street Books were located on the shelf next to Poet Laureate's Donald Hall's new book. Of course Hall's book got very prominent space. But our books were there including:

cyclamens and swords by Helen Bar Lev, and johnmichael simon
The American Wives Club Patricia Brodie
Poem for the Little Book Tomas O'Leary
Shadow People Molly Lynn Watt
Bagels with the Bards Molly Lynn Watt
Louise Solano: The Grolier Poetry Book Shop Holder/Glines

(all these books were included in a printed catalogue handed out to the many guests)


I also noticed Bagel Bard Mike Amado's book: "Unearthed from Ashes ( Dorrance Publishing) was there.I was told by the online archivist that all these titles will be listed in the online directory by the summer. Also: a number of taped interviews I sent will be listed as well.Of course I gave out samples of current and back issue of "Ibbetson Street" and talked up the Bagel Bards...

POETS HOUSE SHOWCASE

The only event of its kind, the annual Poets House Showcase is a free exhibit featuring all of the new poetry books and poetry-related texts published in the United States in a single year—with more than 2,000 titles on view (including volumes by individual authors, anthologies, biographies, critical studies, CDs and DVDs) from over 500 commercial, university and independent presses. Established in 1992 by Executive Director Lee Briccetti, the Showcase reflects Poets House’s mission to make the range of modern poetry available to the public and to stimulate public dialogue on issues of poetry and culture.

During the course of the Showcase, Poets House offers a series of readings, workshops, and receptions, which are designed to provide insight into some of the trends in poetry publishing, to illuminate the often difficult path of the poetry book from poet to reader, and to celebrate the range and power of the American poetic voice.

Each year, Poets House adds the bibliographic records of all the books exhibited in the Showcase to its free, fully-searchable online database, the Directory of American Poetry Books. With over 20,000 titles, the Directory contains the most comprehensive information about U.S. poetry books and publishers from 1990 through 2006.

Doug Holder/Ibbetson Update

Interview with poet, publisher, playwright Diana Saenz

Diana Saenz: A playwright with the soul of a true ‘Boston Poet.”


Diana Saenz is the author of 15 plays, and at least 3 books of poetry. Her plays have been performed across the country and abroad. A former resident of Somerville, Mass., she founded the literary journal “The Boston Poet,” from her home on Putnam Street. Later Saenz went on toCreate the online journal:” BostonPoet.com,” and most recently the “The Boston Poet Journal” which can be purchased on http://www.lulu.com/. I talked with her on my Somerville Community Access TV Program: “Poet to Poet: Writer to Writer.”


Doug Holder: In an essay you wrote about a fictitious argument you had with your cat; your cat argued that he gets unmitigated joy from his art, while you countered all art comes with a certain amount of suffering. So do you feel there is more pain than joy in your writing?

Diana Saenz: That’s a big question. Let’s face it if there was no pain or sorrow then we would be relegated to writing Hallmark Card verse. I don’t think everything we write about is about suffering. Somehow it’s around even when one writes about joy. Everything I write is about a celebration of being alive. But without suffering how would you measure absolute happiness?

If we were to reach a utopian society Poet’s might go out of business. You can only listen to wonderful things so long. There are always going to be things to complain about. Poetry is an art that doesn’t bring in a lot of money, so poets more than any other artists remain honest.

Doug Holder: You are a poet and a playwright. Do the mediums of poetry and theatre compliment each other? Which one do you identify with more?

Diana Saenz: They both compliment each other because they are both oral arts. There is so much poetry in plays. I’ve been a poet since I was fifteen. I am above all a poet. For many years I wrote plays, and for a long period of time I wasn’t able to write poetry. I wrote a play about Lorca, and I had Lorca write a poem in it... But both are definitely connected because they are oral arts.

Doug Holder: Are your plays a vehicle for your poetry?

Diana Saenz: I wouldn’t say that. They are very different mediums. I think being a playwright makes me a much better writer. You are subject to criticism. It’s one thing people saying that they don’t like your poetry, it’s another to read it in The San Francisco Chronicle.

Doug Holder: Were you reviewed in the Chronicle?

Diana Saenz. Yes. Not favorably. But that was one play. I did other plays that got standing ovations and big audiences.

Doug Holder: Did you study Theatre with anyone, or attend a certain school?

Diana Saenz: No. I read a book that was probably written in the 1930’s. I still see that book for sale. I can’t remember the title but it was all about designing a play. I was very involved with the San Francisco theatre scene.

Doug Holder: Why did you leave San Francisco?

Diana Saenz: I had to get out of town. It’s a tiny town. It is a very different town than Boston. San Francisco is a town you can walk from one end to the other.
You run into the same people all the time. It’s a very small pool and I got tired of it. In California people see me as Mexican, and they want me to write Mexican things. Sometimes I do but I am really am an American. I really want to talk about the big questions. Here, in the Boston-area you don’t have a huge Mexican-American presence. People just take you at face value. I like the level of writing—people are a lot more educated here. In San Francisco the “Beat” poetry scene is pervasive. There is a lot of writing about drinking and really being on the outside.

Doug Holder: What is your take on the “Beat” writers like Ginsberg, Corso and Kerouac? They were known to mistreat their women—relegate them to second class citizens—props for the men.

Diana Saenz: One day I decided that I was going to learn everything I could about the “Beats.” I think they drove their women crazy. That’s what I got in my early readings. That women were there to support the male geniuses.

As for their writing I liked “On the Road,” like everyone else. But some of the works I read I wound up throwing them against the wall because I was so irritated about it.

Doug Holder: Somerville has a rich history of small presses. Describe the milieu you were in when you cut your literary teeth in Somerville?

Diana Saenz: I came from San Francisco in 1994, and I was shocked that there were no magazines that listed all the events and venues that were in the area. So I founded my own, “The Boston Poet.”

Doug Holder: What venues did you frequent?

Diana Saenz: I am proud of being part of the open mike scene. I would go to Jack Power’s Stone Soup Poets at T.T the Bear’s. I went to the Cantab Lounge in Central Square, Cambridge.

Doug Holder: Why did you give up “The Boston Poet”

Diana Saenz: It was just so much work. I wound up losing my day job. Bit it was so much fun to do. At the same time I met my husband. He wrote the scholarly articles for the magazine. I wanted to bring the open mike and the academic together.

Doug Holder: Do you think Latina poets are getting more attention now as opposed to when you cut your teeth?

Diana Saenz: There is a tremendously vibrant community of Latin playwrights out there. There is a huge community of Cuban writers from the East Coast. In California there are numerous Latin-American theatres.

Doug Holder: Your play “Dream of Canaries” takes place in an oppressive, fictional Latin American country. Why fictional?

Diana Saenz: I wanted to make the analogy to the United States. I used a Latin American country because of the pressure to write Latin American stuff. The play was commissioned by Teatro de Esperanza in San Francisco. I’ve seen that play produced in Argentina, Guatemala, and yes, even in Poland.

Doug Holder/ Ibbetson Update/ March 2007/ Somerville, Mass.

Two Poets: Two Memoirs: Richard Cambridge/Lo Galluccio

CLICK ON PICTURE TO ENLARGE: Two Poets: Two Memoirs





Poet Lo Galluccio, author of "Hot Rain ( Ibbetson, 2004) ( Pushcart Nominee 2006) and Richard Cambridge ( Curator of the "Poet's Theatre-Club Passim) will read from their anything but coventional memoirs about the artistic life.....

Thursday March 29 7 to 9PM

Emack and Bolio Poetry Series

2 Belgrade Ave. Roslindale

Host: Marc Widershien http://marccreate.com

Hugh Fox the third's new novel "Half Square"

Hugh Fox 's son has a book out that can be downloaded for free at: http://www.lulu.com/content/720329



INTRODUCTION

“Doctor Delta: This is the most dangerous meme in the transcript. The virulence level is very dangerous (6.45). The meme is also highly contagious (7.4). The reader may consider not reading this section of the transcript. Follow memetic infection countermeasures immediately after reading this session. Infected hosts fall into a nihilistic depression and require immediate treatment or the condition will become permanent.
FS: Yeah, the life stages of God are the big determinant of the overall pattern of the universe and have a direct impact on the macrostructure of the universe. The fusion of cosmology and theology is an understanding of the life stages of God but you left out the Anti-God.
DG: The Anti-God?
FS: Sure, each new Big Bang tends to create a duplicate of the last universe but randomness enters into every system and the duplicate is just a little bit different than the last universe. This is because nothing is certain.
DG: That’s for sure.
FS: I don’t mean this as some sort of saying but that literally nothing is certain. A fundamental property of being is uncertainty.
DG: Huh?
FS: This is the materialistic basis of the existential statement that existence precedes essence. The only way you get certainty is to stick with nothingness. Each time the universe is reborn there is a chance that a slightly different God will be reborn that just isn’t into the whole cosmic density management mission.
DG: So you think this can happen?
FS: God like every being generally wants to survive and have progeny. In the case of God having progeny means taking on the whole cosmic density management mission and making sure there is a duplicate of him in the next universe but there might be God that doesn’t want to have progeny and just wants to have fun.
DG: A slacker God.
FS: Right but a lazy God that doesn’t want progeny isn’t so bad since after billions and billions of Big Bangs life will emerge again randomly and the process will start all over again. What you need to watch out for is an Anti-God.
DG: Anti-God? Sounds heavy. What does this Anti-God do?
FS: It is heavy. The Anti-God decides its just time to end the whole Big Bang nonsense and use cosmic density management to make sure there are no more Big Bangs or being of any sort and just end the whole thing i.e. follow the credo “nothing is certain” to it’s logical extreme.
DG: Literally cosmic suicide.
FS: Right, Old man God invariably has these suicidal thoughts as his body i.e. the universe starts to contract during the last 10 billion years of the universe but generally dismisses such thoughts.
DG: So the universe will ultimately end?
FS: Maybe, but since God is a survivor and this is sort of the essence of the personality of God, the emergence of the Anti-God is very unlikely. Unfortunately, it takes billions upon billions of Gods to keep the living universe going. It only takes one Anti-God to stop the whole show. ”
Dear Reader,

Has the above excerpt from this document left you totally confused? Okay, here is the explanation; a graduate school classmate gave me the manuscript you now hold in your hands. We were fellow graduate students at Texas A&M University were we both received a Master’s. We were taking a class in educational psychology about learning theory. I was getting a Master’s of English with a specialization in TESOL. Gamma was getting some sort of educational psychology master’s and was the favorite student of the teacher, a Dr. Castle. A very intelligent and attractive professor but that is neither here nor there.

My classmate went on to get a doctorate in psychology at Harvard. I was under the impression from reports, by fellow classmates, that he had a brilliant, if slightly mysterious career in psychology. He worked at some sort of military think tank in San Antonio. Years later, my classmate arrived at my apartment talking wildly about some sort of conspiracy and gave me a floppy disc that contained this manuscript. I teach English as a foreign language (EFL) at a university in Taipei, Taiwan. Taiwan is fairly far away from the US and I was very surprised my friend came all the way out to Taipei in order to see me. He explained that he came to Taipei in order to put some distance between himself and his mysterious pursuers. I share this manuscript in the hope that the truth of the nature of this manuscript is eventually discovered.

I have no idea if this Dr. Delta is a real person or a delusion of my friend Gamma. As soon as I got the document I did use Google to try to find the Meta-psychology Institute and found a site dealing with the institute but the computer immediately shut down. I turned the computer back on and when I tried to revisit the site I got a 404-error message. I have no idea whatsoever what a 404-error message means. The first Google search yielded about ten references to meta-psychology. A second search using Google was fruitless. All references to meta-psychology that showed up in my first search had disappeared by the time I did my second search. Gamma is of course not the real name of my friend but he wanted me to use this code name and I have decided to respect his wishes. The document follows a transcript format and I have gone ahead and added notes I made as I read the document. The document is not always the easiest read but I assure the reader well worth the time and trouble. There are many interesting and novel ideas in this document. I am positive there is no such thing as memetic infection or a memetic infection control law. I would ignore the warning against reading the document without appropriate security clearance. I would also skip the memetic infection counter measures nonsense at the end of each chapter.

Hugo Ungaro

Letting Go Poems by Robert Collet Tricaro

Letting Go Poems
© 2006 by Robert Collet Tricaro
ISBN 0-89002-385-9 ($16.95)
Northwoods Press


Reviewed by Steve Glines

Most of the poems in this book are not thematically connected to letting go, at least not that I could tell, but there were just enough hints of the catharsis of “letting go” that forced me to read this volume from that point of view. Letting go includes morning past loves as well as past loved ones. The title and the first few poems got me thinking about the nature of immortality.

Our collective conscience knows everyone alive today and we remember many of what could be loosely called the last generation. We no longer have a collective memory that includes what it was like to be at the battle of Gettysburg, to pick a spot at random. Out collective conscious let go of those memories with the passing of the last Civil War veteran. We do have descriptions of events, many poetic, of the people and places of that era. The catharsis of letting go involves the emotional draining of the swamp of past relationships. For a writer with the talent of Robert Collet Tricaro, letting go creates the immortalitzation of places, people and events. That is what I take to be the meaning and purpose of this little volume.

The book opens with a commentary on life:

Carousel

Faro seems bigger than the others,
harness and reins bejeweled with ruby
and sapphire glass, mane dusted
with gold. His eyes are
the wildest of all.

Children stand in his stirrups flailing
the air, shouting to a crown struck
by Faro’s glitter, as this magic carpet
whirls to the tune of the Wurlitzer.

Faro travels at great speed going
nowhere. Perhaps the wildness
in his eyes is really terror, having
learned that no rider can pull him out
from the centripetal rut he is in, as
he is rushed toward
an open distance he’ll never reach.

To immortalize someone gives them life beyond the grave. Plato gave immortal life to an otherwise miscreant character named Socrates. So to Tricaro gives life to an otherwise unnamed Irish cleaning lady:

The Irish Cleaning lady

Eyes gray as industry.
She’d boarded a ship in Cork
a city on her beloved isle,

but where living was hard,
to seek a better life.
Now she wears the starched

pink uniform that her school
kitchen job requires, which
passes for maid’s garb

when she cleans houses
late into the night. This lady
who speaks the brogue

of broad a’s
has work to do,
and a clean house it will be.

Poor in the sense that cars, rings
and fashions are of no
interest to her. Rich

in that cards, rings and fashons
are of no interest to her.
Resourceful in that she can

sew a silk purse from a sow’s ear,
but there’s be nothing in it
a friend, beggar, or thief could want.

Weak tea with a half slice
of marmalade toast for breakfast, thin
Mulligan stew with soda bread

for supper, perhaps
a pear, suit her well.
Her husband has but a small pension,

so she cleans houses.
With no child
of her own, she nevertheless

puts her deceased sister’s children
into their callings – white
turned-around collar for the boy,

nurse’s pin for the girl.
For decades, crouched
under the lash of moral obligation,

could her life have been more
spare, less giving had she

not left her emerald star
in its sky of sea?

We have all known them the little old ladies with a sad story to tell but a story largely kept to themselves so as not to trouble the grandchildren. We secretly wish for divine intervention, a lightning bolt of luck that transforms that losing lottery scratch ticket we all know to be in her purse into a winner capable of transforming her life into “Queen for a day,” a week, a month, just long enough to make her forget her past and smile the broad grin of someone inhaling life for the first time with the appetite of a hungry child. Alas life rarely works out that way and the poet is left with immortalizing a life that would otherwise be forgotten, a life that, without the poet, would cease with its passing.

Mrs. Dory’s Teacups

When her husband was alive a porch was called veranda, Later,
the New York Times became her seat on the stoop
of a four-story, run down walk-up.

Lines in her heavily rouged face, if placed end to end
could mark distance greater then the dimensions of her world –
the stoop and one room just inside the building’s front door.
The closest thing she came to activity was watching
UPS deliveries and girls playing hopscotch near the curb.

Her neighbor Todd ran errands for her. She’s offer him
coca in one of twelve teacups she and Mr. Dory brought
from their native England. Matching plates were sold
to pay for her husband’s cremation,
so she used saucers to serve her home-made scones.
Todd would run his fingers along the cup’s
fourteen-carat rose petals and smile.

She’s sip tea, her little finger extended, speak with clipped
eloquence about children she couldn’t have, her favorite nephew,
slightly older than Todd, who roomed in Greenwich Village
with a friend. She’d ask Todd why he blinked his eyes
so often.
Why at almost eighteen, he’d never dated.

When Mrs. Dory died some months later, her building super
gave Todd a box and a note. Ten teacups were exchanged for
scattering her ashes over Sleepy Hollow.

Two cups were for Todd. The note
included her nephew’s number.

And so it goes. This is a beautiful book of poetry. I recommend it to all.

Bagels with the Bards 2- an anthology of poetry by Boston-area breakfast poets

Introduction by Afaa Michael Weaver
Edited by Molly Lynn Watt
Designed by Steve Glines

"Bagel Bards" founded by Doug Holder and Harris Gardner

"An anthology of poetry by a diverse, and iconoclastic group of poets who have met for breakfast at Au Bon Pains in the Boston area for the past two years..."

To order: http://www.lulu.com/content/729666

From the introduction...


It all came to fruition the day we made our first bagel, after a few energetic drafts of the thing. It got up from the table, shook its rolling shoulders, yawned from the hollow core mouth of itself, and began to dance. At that precise moment, the miracle came as sure as the Matrix Oracle would have predicted from over her pan of cookies. Sunlight hit the bagel, and it became lines on the floor, long lines that would have been perfect for any chorus line, but instead filled themselveswith words, words that made promises to all of us. These words spoke the premise. The poet is a baker although he may never have the dough. We looked at each other and knew this was our creation myth, this dance of language on some piece of paper, or in our hearts, or in the burrowed brow of the manager trying to wrap his head around the idea that poets gather in the corner of his place on Saturdays and spend a few hours living, living, living. O bard, a bagel has become a poem.

-- Affa Michael Weaver

Poets included:

Lo Galluccio
Regie Gibson
Gary Hicks
Ian Thal
Barbara Thomas
Mike Amado
Tom Daley
Gloria Mindock
Matt Rosenthal
J.C. Foritano
Ellen Steinbaum
Irene Koronas
Ricardo Fitter
Doug Holder
Steve Glines
Harris Gardner
Tino Villanueva
Beatriz Alba Del-Rio
Mia Champion
Henry Braun
Pam Rosenblatt
Ann Brudevold
Ann Cahart
Elizabeth Leonard
Marc Goldfinger
Patricia Brodie
Martha Boss
Barbara Bialick
Varsha Kufaka
Barbara Thomas
Deborah M. Priestly
Julia Carlson
Nataniel Mayes
Mignon Ariel King
John Hildebidle
Walter Howard
Elizabeth Doran
Tim Gager
Lainie Senechal
Martha Boss
Robert K. Johnson
Eytan Fichman
Abbot Ikeler
Afaa Michael Weaver
Tomas O'Leary
Molly Lynn Watt
Chad Parenteau
Mary Buchinger
Richard Wilhelm
Henry Braun
Llyn Clague
Mike Amado
Elizabeth Tom
Harris Gardner
Doug Holder

Opening the Door to French Film by Hugh Fox

OPENING THE DOOR TO FRENCH FILM
by Hugh Fox
2007, World Audience, Inc. (no price listed)
review by Richard Wilhelm http://richardwilhelm.blogspot.com


I was looking forward to digging into Hugh Fox’s "Opening the Door to French Film." As the introduction by Eric Greinke says, the book is designed to be an informal commentary on the work of various French directors from the 1930’s to the present. The writing is certainly free of academic jargon. The tone is conversational, sometimes to a fault. Street corner vernacular is frequently less precise than standard English. Fox is so informal that his language on occasion confuses rather than clarifies. The informal, conversational approach seems welcoming in the first pages as Fox describes the plots of the various films of each director. Forty or fifty pages into the book however this approach grows tedious. Imagine sitting down with a friend who starts telling you, one-by-one, the plots of a hundred and twenty-some films. Interesting at first, but it quickly gets tiresome.


It seems there could have been a better way to organize this book but Fox had a vision of the book he wanted to write, so it is only fair to judge the book as it is written. And his vision was to write a chapter on each director, describing the plots of various films with commentary. Fox has some worthwhile insights on each director’s themes and methods and this makes the book worth owning. But since the approach makes the book tedious to read cover-to-cover, the reader is better served by just diving in at any point of interest, i.e., pick a director one likes or is curious about and jump in. To this end, it would have been helpful to have an index, though the spacing of the typeface makes skimming the chapters relatively easy.


One must take Fox to task for the many errors, typos, misspellings, and stylistic inconsistencies in this book. In his chapter on Luis Bunuel, he launches into a description of the 1977 film "The Obscure Object of Desire" which he correctly calls "Bunel’s (sic) last film. Two pages before, he discusses "The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie" which he tells us was released in 1991. It was released in 1972. In a discussion of Bertrand Tavernier’s 1986 film, "Round Midnight," Fox speaks of "the friendship between the Frenchman and the gringo saxophonist." Why would he use "gringo" to describe an African-American musician in a context devoid of any Mexicans? The saxophonist is not a "gringo" to the Frenchman. It is depressing to encounter a book published by a writer who shows so little regard for his craft. It makes the reader not trust the material.


I was surprised Fox did not mention the 1945 film "Children of Paradise," written by Jacques Prevert and directed by Marcel Carne, regarded by some as the greatest French film ever produced. (Not to quibble, but neither was there mention of the 1986 film by Jacques Beineix, "Betty Blue," a personal favorite of this reviewer. But, in fairness, Fox can’t possibly be expected to mention every film produced in France. The book is a personal, rather than an encyclopedic, survey of French film.)


Fox’s knowledge and insight—and his reputation—would have been better served
had he taken the time to give his book a serious, professional editing. Nonetheless it’s a fun book for film buffs.


--Richard Wilhelm
Ibbetson Update

* Richard Wilhelm is the arts/editor for the Ibbetson Street Press.

Cervena Barva Press Celebrates Two Year Anniv. April 26 McIntyre and Moore Books--Somerville

CERVENA BARVA PRESS CELEBRATES TWO YEAR ANNIVERSARY
McIntyre & Moore Booksellers
255 Elm St. (Davis Square)
Somerville, MA 02144-3222
April 26th, 7:30 PM, Free, Handicap Accessible

Readers: Andrey Gritsman, Doug Holder, and Don Share
Andrey Gritsman is a native of Moscow, Russia, lives in the NYC area, and works as a Physician. Mr. Gritsman is the author of poetry in Russian: No Man’s Land (Petropol, S. Petersburg), Double (Hermitage, New York), Transfer (Arion, Moscow), and Island in the Woods (Pushkin Foundation Publishing House, S. Petersburg), and View From the Bridge (poems & essays in Russian and English) published by WORD in NY. Other books include Long Fall: Poems, Texts, and Essays in English (Spuyten Duyvil Press, 2005), and In Transit (English with Romanian translations, Bucharest, Romania, 2005). He has been published in numerous literary magazines including Richmond Review, Ars Interpres, Poetry International, Confrontation and others. His work appears in numerous anthologies including Modern Poetry in Translation (UK) and Crossing Centuries (New Generation in Russian Poetry), and in The Breath of Parted Lips: Voices From The Robert Frost Place (CavanKerry Press). Twice nominated for The Pushcart Prize and was shortlisted for the PEN/American Center Joyce Osterweil Poetry Award in 2005. He runs the Intercultural Poetry Series at Cornelia St. Café in NYC and is editor of Interpoezia, an online journal of international poetry.
(Andrey has a poetry postcard forthcoming by Cervena Barva Press and was interviewed in the February, 2007 Newsletter).

Doug Holder founded the Ibbetson Street Press in 1998. He has published over 30 books of poetry by local and national poets and 20 issues of the literary journal Ibbetson Street. Doug is co-founder of The Somerville News Writer’s Festival and curates the Newton Free Library Poetry Series. Doug interviews contemporary writers and has a show on Somerville Access Community TV called "Poet to Poet." His work has been in numerous literary journals including Rattle, Doubletake, The Boston Globe Magazine, Poesy, Small Press Review, Artword Quarterly, Manifold, the new renaissance, and The Café Review. Work in anthologies include Inside the Outside: An Anthology of Avant-Garde American Poets (Presa Press), Greatest Hits: Twelve Years of Compost Magazine (Zephyr Press), and America’s Favorite Poems (edited by Robert Pinsky)
(Doug’s chapbook, Of All The Meals I Had Before: Poems About Food and Eating, will be released at this reading from Cervena Barva Press and he will be reading work from his chapbook. Doug was interviewed by Cervena Barva Press in the May, 2006 Newsletter).


Don Share is Curator of the Woodberry Poetry Room atHarvard University, Editor Literary Imagination, andPoetry Editor of Harvard Review. He teaches atHarvard and in the Lesley University MFA program. Hisbooks include Squandermania, new from Salt Publishing;Union, (a finalist for the Boston Globe/ PEN NewEngland Winship Award for outstanding book), Seneca inEnglish, and I Have Lots of Heart, translations ofMiguel Hernåndez (which received the Times Literary Supplement Translation Prize). His critical edition of the poems of Basil Bunting is forthcoming from Faberand Faber.
(Don was interviewed by Cervena Barva Press in the February, 2007 Newsletter).
Gloria Mindock founded Cervena Barva Press in April, 2005.
The Press publishes poetry and fiction chapbooks and full-length plays, fiction, poetry, memoirs, and poetry postcards by writers from all over the world. The press has published many writers with prestigious awards between them such as Gary Fincke, Eric Pankey. Michael Burkard, David Ray, John Minczeski, Dzvinia Orlowsky, Catherine Sasanov, Simon Perchik, Rane Arroyo, and others. Many international writers will be published this year including Flavia Cosma, Martin Burke, Susanne Morning, Ioan Tepelea, David Hill, Michael Nash, Denis Emorine, to name a few.
Local writers published this year are Doug Holder, Mary Bonina, Harris Gardner, Philip Burnham, Leela Arnet, and poetry postcards by Irene Koronos, Debra Priestly, Matt Rosenthal, and others.
On the Cervena Barva Press Website, readers can find out what’s new with the press, read the monthly newsletter online where writers are interviewed, look for readings and events in the local area as well as from all over the world, and check out the chapbook poetry and fiction contests that are held each year by the press.
Cervena Barva Press runs an online bookstore called, The Lost Bookshelf, where the press sells their publications as well as books by writers/publishers on consignment.

Contact Information: Mary Curtin, Events Coordinator, 617-241-9664, 617-470-5867 (cell), marycurtin@comcast.net
Gloria Mindock, Cervena Barva Press, Editor: editor@cervenabarvapress.com
http://www.cervenabarvapress.com
http://www.thelostbookshelf.com

Fairy Tales For Writers by Lawrence Schimel

Fairy Tales for Writers. Lawrence Schimel (A Midsummer Night’s Press. 16 W. 36th St. 2nd Floor. NY, NY 10018 http://www.amidsummernightspress.com) $6.50

“Fairy Tales for Writers” by Lawrence Schimel is a new release by the small press “A Midsummer Night’s Press” of New York City. I love Schimel’s conceit of using fairy tales as templates for his poems of the writing life. In this little book you have all the players and places you most likely encountered in your travels in the literary milieu. In “Little Mermaid” a young, idealistic woman falls under the spell of a charismatic but Janus-faced MFA professor:

“She slaved to scrape together on
enough money to join the MFA
where he taught working double shifts
as a waitress that sent sharp pains
shooting up her legs from being on her feet
all day and night. She had no time to write
But she bore it all silently, buoyed by the memory
of their time together at the conference,
and the promise the future held.

At the cocktail party, the night before
the first day of classes, where the students were
to meet and mingle with the faculty and each other,
he introduced her to his wife,
who had also once aspired to write, but now
was content to remain in his shadow,
to be seen on his arm when he won awards and
to look the other way when he followed
his wandering eye.”

And in the poem “Sleeping Beauty” the poet examines the damage unconstructive and mean-spirited criticism can do to a writer in the formative stages; literally freezing him or her in their track, like, well, “Sleeping Beauty”:

“Be it from parent or teacher, sibling or spouse,
just one tiny prick of criticism is all it takes sometimes
to put a burgeoning writer to sleep
for a hundred years,
for a lifetime
for so long that no princes are left
to hack through the brambles,
or if one is, he can’t imagine that he should bother.”

This is a charming mini-chap from “A Mid Summer Night’s Press.”

Doug Holder/Ibbetson Update/ March 2007/ Somerville, Mass.