It would indeed be possible to "herd cats"--with a team of properly trained hyenas.

There's Clifford Brown all day today on my favorite internet radio station, WKCR in New York from Columbia University. Clifford is my favorite trumpet player after Miles, who is beyond category.

The Duplications: Nada Gordon, "Nugatory Wax Milk Goats"

From now until end of November will be "poetry Goddess" month on The Duplications. Of course I'd like to have women submit to the magazine all year round, but in practice it's been about a five to one ration of submissions (male to female).

I'm writing the poem below, "Mayhew's Mood," in public, as it were. Thanks to all those who have liked parts of it so far. It's going to be quite a long poem by my standards, even after I edit out some less than inspired parts.

I fear I was unclear about my earlier post on politics and poetry. My position is that teaching Proust in a purely formalist way in a small bible college is a worthwhile activity, even if is judged a mostly "conservative" activity. Or that teaching literature badly in a Marxist-Leninist educational system still has value. That there is a residue not accounted for by simply analyzing the ideological implications of 1) the literary works themselves 2) the context in which these works are taught. I am too lazy to demonstrate this. It's more of a conviction or prejudice I have than a theoretical position.

I received this email this afternoon:


"Hola, como estas, leí algo tuyo en Internet y
me gustaría saber si podemos utilizar una cita tuya
que literalmente dice: "Construyo negligencias; el
punto y coma como una araña insuflada de
insuficiencia. Según el poeta japonés, el viejo perro
pone cara de escuchar el cántico de los gusanos". Mi
nombre es Igor Villatoro, radico en Denver, Co., y
unos amigos en México están preparando un
mediometraje, yo estoy encargado del Story Line, asi
que quiero saber si podemos utilizar al principio
del vídeo tus palabras. Sin más por el momento y en
espera de una respuesta favorable, te envío un cordial
saludo. Luego te puedo mandar copia del trabajo.

Igor"

Someone wants to use a poem I wrote in a short movie in Mexico. What makes this kind of neat is that I had forgotten completely about this poem, and now realize that I like it quite a bit:


"I construct negligences; the semi-colon

like a spider puffed up with insufficiency

According to the Japanese poet, the old dog makes a face

as though he were listening to the canticle of the worms."




The reference is to a haiku by Issa.

In conversation with my Latin Americanist colleagues an issue came up. They worry that literature itself is a conservative thing. That is, they view the object of study itself as somehow suspect, infused with conservative baggage that it is their task to be suspicious of. I don't feel at all this way. That is, I feel that "literature" can be positioned anywhere in political terms, depending on the circumstances, but that there is nothing inherently conservative about literature itself. I don't know whether this difference is due to the fact that I am not a Latin Americanist and don't have the ideological baggage of that particular field, or whether it is because I am a poet and cannot feel that literature is something I can hold at arm's length. Possibly it is the idea that teaching only literature, or teaching literature without the requisite socio-political contextualization, is a conservative enterprise.

Although it is only comparatively recently that I have considered myself a "career" poet, I think I do identify poetry as part of myself. There are plenty of political issues surrounding literature and poetry that are interesting to discuss, and I have all sorts of political opinions that are not far removed from those of my colleagues, but I cannot view political concerns as an acid test of the value of literature or poetry. Even a "conservative" body of work will end up having a certain value that is not confined by its ideology. If someone proved to me the Euripides was "conservative" in the context of his time, that he was on the wrong side politically, I would still stick with Euripides. I would say that that is very interesting, but that that is not the way Euripides is to be judged in the first place. By the same token, I would not admire him more if it were proven that he was "progressive" for his time. In short, I lose no sleep worrying whether teaching literature is a conservative thing to do. Creating poetic texts is something people do, have always done. It's like asking whether breathing is conservative.

What do you all think?

In my rather facetious quiz the other day I put Norman Finkelstein's name on the wrong list. I was thinking of a particular poet and Norman's name came to mind. Of course, I can't remember who I was trying to think of, because whenever I do Norman's name comes up. I am rather embarrassed because of course Norman is not at all equivalent to the other SoQ names I put there. He has written about Bronk, Ronald Johnson, and other poets I admire. I've emailed a friend with psychic abilities who can tell me who it was I was really thinking of. Stay tuned. Multiple apologies to Norman Finkestein. Not that there is any shame in being associated with other poets on this list, but simply because the association was not at all accurate.

A line I'd like to steal today: Waiting for Ezra to show up with ribs.

No: A Journal of the Arts (issue 4, 2005) is jampacked with good stuff. (Cyrus Console dropped off an issue to my office yesterday. How's that for service.) It has David Shapiro, Barbara Guest, Robin Blaser, Kenneth Irby, Cole Swensen, Clark Coolidge, Mary Jo Bang, Robert Creeley, some chapters from Lisa Jarnot's Duncan biography. It's got John Yau, Arthur Danto on Guston. It has Cyrus himself, David Perry. Not to mention Gizzi, Lauterbach, Gander, Moure, Lerner, Welish, Bernstein, Harryman, Berssenbrugge. This is about the most high-powered issue of a magazine I've seen since that Conjunctions anthology of a few years back. I've been carrying this around everywhere I go, but mostly just reading and re-reading the Creeley sequence "Caves" and the Shapiro and Guest poems.

Here are a few of my favorite small jazz groups, in no particular order. My choices aren't particularly original, I'm afraid. I'm thinking of groups that were real groups, not just people who got together just to record. These are not just collections of musicians, but organic units.

Miles Davis Quintet of the 1950s with Coltrane, Red Garland, Paul Chambers, and Philly Joe.

Miles Davis Quintet of the 1960s with Shorter, Hancock, Ron Carter, Tony Williams.

Other permutations of Miles Davis groups with Cannonball Adderly, Bill Evans, Jimmy Cobb.

John Coltrane Quartet with Tyner and Elvin Jones. Various bass players but mostly Jimmy Garrison. Add Eric Dolphy to the group too.

Ornette Coleman Quartets with Cherry, Billy HIggins, Haden. (and other permuations with LaFaro and Blackwell).

Clifford Brown/Max Roach groups with Harold Land on tenor, Richie Cole on piano.

Early Art Blakey groups with Clifford Brown.

Parker, Dizzy, with Max Roach and various piano and bass.

Mingus groups with Danny Richmond on drums, Jackie Byard, and Dolphy. Various other players like Booker Little on trumpet.

Monk with Sonny Rollins, Max Roach.

Early Monk with Art Blakey.

Jimmy B's state capital poems having been kicking my ass recently. Sure, the cartoons remain amusing, and the WTHIUWYAP is a laugh a minute, but the poems are even better.

except... no poetry.

I can imagine an "eclecticism" that left out 90% of what was significant to me. That would ring hollow.