grilled cheese, fries, red velvet cake and Merlot for breakfast.
I have two posts written and nearly ready to go next to this one. There’s just nothing in them, they’re full of buttercream. I’d like to think I’ve grown past faking it. But maybe not. As a good friend once wrote: “fake it till your dreams come true.” Part of me has a sinking feeling that said dreams will be sitting on the bench a long time while their half-formed shells play the court [jester].
I haven’t felt like connecting at all lately. Not on the internet, not personally, not creatively. I haven’t felt a strong connection with any of my muses in the last few months; instead I’ve been using fucked up medical insurance policies and missed prescription refills as creative fodder. Did you know it can cost in upwards of $1200 a month to stay “sane?” I didn’t until last Monday.
I’ve drowned myself in reading about manic-depression. Books like Touched With Fire: Manic-Depression and the Artistic Temperament and An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness by Dr. Kay Jamison and Manic-Depressive Insanity and Paranoia by Dr. Emil Kraepelin (who’s considered to be the founder of contemporary scientific psychiatry, and one of the first to truly commentate on manic-depression as a legitimate disease). To break from the science-speak, I’ve been re-reading certain classics under scrutiny, namely The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath (duh) and The Voyage Out by Virgina Woolf, with breaks in between to satisfy the Taurus in me with The Hedonism Handbook.
You probably don’t give a shit about my reading list, but there you have it. The stones in my pockets keeping me under the ocean and away from humanity. There’s a war being waged up on shore, and I’m content to listen to it crumble from down here.
To get back to poetry-related things, I was in Birmingham, Alabama recently to see Amanda Palmer. The trip was part of a series I’ve yet to discuss on here, which I’m tentatively calling “The Art of the Oxymoronic Jetset.” (Or “A Pauper’s Jetset?” Regardless, stay tuned for details.) While I was waiting for room service to grace me with a glass of much needed Merlot and grilled cheese, the editor for The Great American Poetry Show, Larry Ziman, called me unexpectedly. To paraphrase, for length:
(click the cut to read the conversation)
Continue Reading…
On this great day of our 44th president’s inauguration, I have a publication update:
Editor CJ Laity at Chicagopoetry.com informed me this morning that I am one of thirty-three poets to be included in the new issue of CRAM magazine! Apparently the response to the open-call for poetry was completely overwhelming this time around, and I’m guessing it’s because Chicagopoetry.com is one of the finest sites for poetry on the internet. They’ve been nothing but good to me, and do an excellent job of keeping those in the area up-to-date on artistic happenings around ChicagoLand.
For volume 4, I’m honored to be included with other fine artists, from Australia, South Korea, the United Kingdom and of course, my beloved Chicago. An excerpt from the email:
Congratulations on being selected for inclusion in the publication Cram 4, which will be distributed free to the public at this year’s AWP Conference in Chicago, and at other public literary events. There will be 400 copies of Cram printed up. We hope to have the book printed up by the end of the month, so that we can distribute some advance copies at this year’s marathon poetry reading at Woodland Pattern bookstore in Milwaukee. A copy of the publication will also be mailed to you free of charge if you can’t personally pick it up at one of the release events. Additional copies will be made available for the cost of shipping and handling, if you are out of town and would like multiple copies. You can find information about how to do that in the upcoming days at Chicagopoetry.com
I will update all of you when copies are finally available, so you can grab one before they’re gone for good. CRAM is hand-made by editor CJ Laity, and truly are collector’s items. For merely the cost of shipping you can own a copy of one of the best independent and non-profit publications in the Midwest! Details to come.
(You can view the [words]” section above, and find my entry for volume 2 of the series, titled “He’s a Drummer by Trade.”)
No clue who the artist is. It wasn't me however. I <3 Google Image Search.
The poem they’ve chosen for publication is one I first wrote during my senior year of college at Oklahoma State University entitled “My Own Lord Henry.” (The poem has seen several revisions since.) The title comes from a character in the Oscar Wilde book “The Portrait of Dorian Grey.” I became obsessed with the delightfully sinful Lord Henry Wotton character. His jaded demeanor and the almost sadistic way he latched on to Dorian aroused me. Henry had seemingly done it all; he’d eaten, fucked, smoked, drank and talked his way into bitterness. This was the passage that sparked the poem:
“I represent to you all the sins you have never had the courage to commit…I have known everything, but I am always ready for a new emotion. I am afraid, however, that, for me at any rate, there is no such thing.” -Lord Henry
At the poem’s inception, I’d met a man much like Henry, and wanted very badly to prove to him that I could be that thing to shake his tired heart awake, that I was a menu he’d never tasted. How that story ends, well, you’ll just have to keep reading. In keeping with the spirit of my adolescent Pumpkins saga and promised tales of meeting Amanda Palmer…I’ll tell you about Henry as well. You might fall in love. Or hate. Either way is fine with me.
Details on much, much more soon, but I must be off now to serve alcohol to alcoholics. Vice is one of my favorite things.
As of yesterday, I’ve received my first copy of The Poet’s Place: A Collection of Works, my first official publication of 2009:
A peek inside The Poet's Place. (xxoo)
Copies of the book are still available here, and right now you can get them on sale for $11. (Or you can find the link on my side bar under “where to buy.”)
Apparently I have more librarian friends than I realized, and many of them are ordering copies of the book for their local libraries to stock. Thank you, you know who you are!
I’ve been receiving a lot of emails lately from friends and teachers long past asking how I’ve been. I can only hope this site provides any answers I may have left out in our conversations. Hopefully as you peruse my word designs, you can read between the increasingly small lines, and fuzzy pictures can be made clear.
Currently, aside from the other artists in The Poet’s Place, I’m reading a mind-blowing book called Chasing Cool: Standing Out in Today’s Cluttered Marketplace by Noah Kerner (former DJ and now CEO of Noise marketing agency) and Gene Pressman (former CEO and creative director of Barneys New York):
What I'm reading during downtime at work. Never mind the vodka, that came later.
Nearly from page one this book has given me the reassurance I need every so often that indeed following your gut is the best way to go, and that there’s inspiration everywhere, the best parts just begging to be plucked and re-molded into something better. A few quotes from the book:
- “There’s always another way to break through.”
- “There are a lot of people who are too far ahead of the curve and are unsuccessful because of it. Success happens when a person like me, who looks at those types of people, can create a business that works.”
- “Being a creative leader is a really out-there place to be. By definition, it’s a step beyond where people have been and there’s no path. But if you can come second and make something better, that’s no less valid. You’re gonna take first place by doing the same thing with 20/20 vision. There’s something to be said for watching and learning.”
- “Thinking you’ll achieve specialness by emulating someone else’s terms (or simply inverting them) isn’t much different than applying a coat of paint to a cracked wall.”
- “…all that time yielded one common thread: none of these people (those successful in their respective marketing) chased anything. They trusted their guts, put their names on the line, and followed their personal passions…They pursued a vision and, then, somewhere down the road, cool found them.”
- “Things are moving fast. The white noise is deafening.”
I may steal that last one and use it as a sub-header sometime, it’s goregous. I’m hardly halfway thru the book, but it’s already giving me ideas about how to work the site, how to sell my product and my art, and have it reflect my true intentions, since, I realized, my audience ultimately is myself. If I’m not happy with my product or my look, how on earth can I expect anyone else to be?
Also, in keeping with the positives, I’ve now gone global:
Who'd have ever thought people in New Zealand would be looking at my site?
It’s true, from Mexico to Latvia, New Zealand to Canada I’ve had visitors from around the globe thus far. That just blows my fucking mind, frankly, and I’m excited as hell to continue to put up new work.
Expect submission updates very shortly, and I’m also hard at work brainstorming ideas for a new site layout, one that better reflects my writing style and personality, and a new page outlining some of my biggest inspirations so look forward to that!
Until then, carry on, always.
