Reading 10/26 at Duquesne University, Pittsburgh

I will be reading at Duquesne University on Monday October 26th, at 7:00 p.m. The event is part of the Coffee House Reading Series, which is organized and sponsored by Duquesne’s English Department. It takes place at the Barnes & Noble Café in the Power Center (1015 Forbes Ave., at the corner of Hooper). I am reading in conjunction with a fiction writer by the name of Bill Kirchner, about whom I have heard good things.

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In other news, I was recently interviewed on internet radio. The show, hosted by Mike Marcellino, is called Notebookwriter and runs as part of the Red River Writers Live show on BlogTalkRadio. The interview, which took place on October 7th, is archived and can be listened to here.

Three Poems in Iota 85

I have three poems in Iota 85. Iota is a British poetry journal that has been around for a pretty long time. I remember encountering it in a different form in the late 90s, when it was an A5 folded-over and stapled production and I think always rendered as iota with a small i. It had a certain recognition in Britain and Ireland as one of the stalwart small press poetry journals. Recently the magazine has passed into the hands of a new editorial team associated with the University of Gloucestershire (headed by Nigel McLoughlin), and has reincarnated itself as a high-quality perfect-bound book with color cover and French flaps.

The production is excellent, but I have to say that the poetry between those flaps is pretty damn good too (and not just because I’m in it). Irish poet Howard Wright’s new work, which leads off this issue, is especially strong. I published him a few times a while back in The Burning Bush, but here in Iota he’s better than ever. Just about every poet I’ve happened upon so far in this issue has been interesting to me in some way or another. The magazine includes not only poems, but reviews and interviews (George Szirtes is one of the poets interviewed), and a section for listings of poetry events (predominantly taking place in Britain). Such high-quality work, coupled with its high production values, would have to have Iota on its way to being considered one of the top British poetry journals, I would think? Copies can be ordered through their website (linked above).

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In other news, an interview I did with the New York punk band Chesty Malone and the Slice ’Em Ups is online at Punk Globe.

New (York) Mets uniforms?

The Mets have announced, or sort of announced, that they might be making a uniform change after this most dismal of seasons. Reportedly, the possible changes involve dropping the traditional pinstripes, and going with a cream-colored uniform like the one they wore this past August. Here’s David Wright in that uniform, being escorted out to to his position at third by the Mets trainers, as is his usual fashion. The bat-boy then comes over, bows, and gives him his hat, bows to the four corners of Citi Field, and sprints back to the dugout. David picks up a pinch of Citi infield dirt, ceremonially smears it on the front of his uniform, and rolls up his sleeves so that you can see the sleeves of his orange undershirt. The crowd over at the third-base side, known as “David’s Army,” roll up their own sleeves in an exaggerated manner, in tribute to their hero, and high-five each other. Some are simply wearing orange Mets t-shirts with the number 5 on them. Wright, number 5, is the famous Mets singles hitter.

So anyway, yeah, this or something like this might be the new Mets uniform. Some people say who cares. And anyway isn’t this a poetry blog, mainly? (Well actually this is a very poetic post, to be honest....) Others are alarmed at the fact that it seems the pinstripes are going to be ditched. I agree; keep the pinstripes. Bizarrely, a couple of people have actually suggested a blue alternate jersey, like the Mets should rock this blue solid look, like the Cubs do sometimes (the Mets should imitate a team that hasn’t won the World Series for over 100 years)(don’t get me wrong, I would actually like to see the Cubs win; that would be a great moment to see, but hopefully not in a blue jersey). Thankfully, at least it’s pretty clear now that no one likes the black jersey or the all-black hat. That’s capitalistic bullshit. They see through that now, finally.

So really, why have an alternate jersey at all? A black this, a blue that, an alternate this or that? No. There should be one home jersey and one away jersey. For the home jersey, the (maybe off-)white pinstriped 1969 classic Mets jersey, no drop-down black shadowing, no stripes on the sides, no trim. Just a classic button-down jersey, white with pinstripes. The one Tom Seaver is wearing in 1970 on Camera Day at Shea Stadium, holding this weird toy. (As photographed by Stephen Hanks, Camera Day at Shea Stadium, 1970, found online....) Tom Terrific knew where it was at. Riding the subway out to Shea in the 70s meant seeing all the newest graffiti, what early tags were getting up, what early 3-D style. He knew how the New York fans were feeling. But anyway, that is the home uniform they need. And for the away jersey, grey with the classic NEW YORK lettering like they have now, but with no shadowing. That is my considered aesthetic opinion. What to do about Oliver Pérez is a whole other thing.

David Stone, Under the El

In my view, David Stone is one of our most original experimental poets, though he is not sung in the halls of academe or in the HTML code of poetry blogs as often as he should be. That situation will change eventually, I think, as time goes on and Stone’s small press collections, chapbooks, and pamphlets get collected into more readily available volumes.

One of these chapbooks, though, quite available now, is Stone’s latest, Under the El, published by Alternating Current/Propaganda Press. It includes the long poem “Under the El,” set in Chicago where familiar Stonean elements congregate: “& on the asphalt/ a turkey vulture dines.” Shorter poems return to the setting of Baltimore, that apocalyptic city where Stone now lives: “another murderous day/ in this sad city/ where teachers/ are raped by students/ & more beatings on the buses/ & on subways” (“The Subway Glance”).

This is a poet who takes up death, history, war, and urban America unflinchingly, but whose language is therefore a little weird — stripped down to short declaratory sentences, as if desperately clinging to some sense of basic grammatical order. Unlike some experimentalists, whose language often reflects the disorder they find (by all means a valid and often beautiful response), philosopher Stone seeks beautiful logic in the illogical, if only in a ritual sense (as in “YK,” his Yom Kippur poem). There is always a subject and a verb, often an object, though each might not be the expected.

A poem that succinctly illustrates what Stone does is “The Fire Engine”:

The Fire Engine

The fire engine
skidded through
the intersection
& crushed
a compact car.

Earth whisked
wizardous rants.

Breathers reiterated
the aroma of death.

The cell counters
apologized
in Socrates’ tank.

Order Under the El through one of the links here, or through the mail for $5 (plus $2 U.S. shipping; $3 out-of-U.S. shipping) via cash, check, or money order made out to Alternating Current, P.O. Box 398058, Cambridge MA 02139, U.S.A.

Jim Carroll, 1949-2009

I heard today that the great poet Jim Carroll died, and it was one of those weird moments where you say “Wow, that’s crazy, because I was just talking about him” – and indeed I was just telling someone the other day what a great poet he is (was), and pulled out his Catholic Boy album, and we briefly talked about the cover, how he’s standing there with these older people who it seems may be his parents, yet at the same time his cock is let’s say rather prominently noticeable through his jeans, and anyway “People Who Died” among others is a great song.

Like Patti Smith, Jim Carroll made the transition from being known primarily as a poet to also being known as a punk singer. I got into his writing after first digging his music (particularly Catholic Boy). Living at the Movies still stands as a landmark collection of poetry, drawing on the tradition of Arthur Rimbaud and the Symbolists, as well as the conversational New York vibe of Frank O’Hara (as in for example the opening of “To the Secret Poets of Kansas”):

Just because I can’t understand you
it doesn’t mean I hate you...like
when you go on continuously how you
cannot tolerate skyscrapers or cab drivers

                maniac faces on Fifth, well

it means nothing to me I
just ignore as so often...

Well Rimbaud and O’Hara, I suppose these are not original comparisons, but if you are as good or even almost as good as them, then you’re in good company. And Jim Carroll is. The New York Times obituary calls him a “poet and punk rocker in the outlaw tradition of Rimbaud and Burroughs.” He was also the son of a bar owner. Most people probably know of Carroll because of the film The Basketball Diaries (still to my mind Leonardo DiCaprio’s best role). The film is good; the book is better. Better still his poetry. This is his short poem “Song”:

Song

In minute gestures
                    that jet wetly slight
        right above your eyes
                                        each morning
I watch the sun cross over the reservoir
        all day sometimes
                     a few hours soaked into air cotton
like cloud syringes drawing up blue
                          like darkness when it’s through

Of course, offering a couple short extracts does not do Carroll justice. But when a poet dies one immediately thinks of his words, just as when a rock star dies (again he was both, though “star” might be stretching it) perhaps you play the music. Though Carroll was 60 years old, I can’t help thinking of the lines from his song “I Want the Angel,” which go, “And those who died young, they are my heroes/ They are my heroes, they took the walk/ Where the heart made sense and the mind can’t talk.” Here (below) is Jim Carroll doing “People Who Died,” and hopefully he wouldn’t mind me writing a new verse, maybe, at least in my head, something like “Jimmy had a heart attack, 60 years old, he looked like 55 when he died, he was a friend of mine...”

Six Gallery Press reading, 8/29

I am participating in a Six Gallery Press reading in Pittsburgh next Saturday, August 29. It’s taking place at Modern Formations Gallery, 4919 Penn Ave. Doors open at 8:00; I’ll be one of the later readers. The full list of participants is on the flier, above. I don’t know if they serve alcohol there or not. Hope so. In any case, I’ll try to be interesting. See you there?

Dánta i bhFeasta

Agus sinn i measc mhí Lúnasa (mí a dhéanann comóradh ar Lugh, léirithe ar clé), cad eile ach go mbeadh eagrán Lúnasa 2009 (Imleabhar 62, Uimhir 8, ISSN 0014-8946) de Feasta againn. Is “reiviú den smaointeachas Éireannach” an t-irisleabhar seo, agus le Comhar is na nuachtáin Lá is Foinse imithe ón saol, tá tábhacht ar leith a bhaineann le Feasta anois — ní hamháin do léitheoirí na Gaeilge, ach mar cheann de na hardáin is deireanaí atá fágtha le haghaidh tráchtaireachta Gaelaí ar an saol mór.

Is onóir dom bheith foilsithe ann. Tá ceithre dhán de mo chuid san eagrán seo — “Gan Codladh go Gaillimh”, “Lá Bealtaine thar Sáile”, “Fuisce” agus “Ollamh”. Tá costas clúdaigh €5 ar Fheasta, agus is fiú an léamh.

Órdaigh ó: An Siopa, 6 Sr. Fhearchair, Baile Átha Cliath 2, Éire / Fón: 353-(0)1-4783814 / Ríomhphost: feasta@eircom.net

Burdock 6

The sixth issue of Burdock, the Milwaukee journal edited by Keith Gaustad, has been out for a month or two, and I am just now getting around to noting it. It’s the all-women’s issue, assisted by Dolly Lemke and Jon Lohr, is packed full of good poems, and is worth acquiring. Email Keith at burdockmagazine@gmail.com and he’ll work something out.

Here is the list of contributors: Susan Firer, Izzy Oneiric, Peggy Munson, Catherine Averill, Joann Chang, Julie Strand, Stevie Curl, Emily Rutter, Jessi Harrison, Becca Klaver, Jennifer Kraft, Meghan M. Lee, Y Madrone, Meg Reilly, Abigail Stokes, Dolly Lemke, Zenobia Frost, Janelle Crawford, Mary DeMars — that’s a lot of women!

You can read their complete bio notes online at www.teppichfresser.blogspot.com, and get further information about Burdock and its associated Teppichfresser Press there as well.

Yes, that’s right, Milwaukee....

Kill Poet Press 7

The new issue of Kill Poet Press (issue 7, subtitled Drawn and Quartered) is online and I’ve got a poem in it titled “Bat.” It also appears in print, and the whole journal can be purchased for a mere $6.00 through the Kill Poet store.

Sky Saxon, 1937(?)-2009

Sky Saxon died on June 25th. If you’re not familiar, he was the singer of the Seeds, the great 60s garage punk band probably best known for the song “Pushin’ Too Hard.” Saxon’s eulogizers tend to dismiss the Seeds as “rudimentary” (as if the best rock’n’roll isn’t), and even in their day they were sometimes considered disposable. But if you actually listen to them with fresh ears you see that this isn’t the full story. Listen to the guitar solo in “Pushin’ Too Hard.” It might be easy enough to play the notes, but how many people actually get that sound, especially now, and who would use it? Listen to the singing on “Painted Doll.” That’s a great voice, and actually kind of reminiscent of 50s doo wop, in an ostensibly “limited” 60s psychedelic milieu.

Not long ago, when Ron Asheton died, critics were coming out of the woodwork describing the Stooges too as a “rudimentary” group. I've got news for you — that’s the point; that’s a good thing. In the Stooges’ case, a basic song structure provided the foundation for some pretty amazing and intense playing, especially by Ron Asheton. I’m not saying that the Seeds were as good as the Stooges, but for anyone who likes rock’n’roll, the Seeds have their place in the pantheon of 60s punk, the often overlooked genre perhaps best anthologized on the Nuggets compilation albums.

Punk as we conceive of it today of course originated with the CBGBs scene in mid-70s New York City (the Sex Pistols, as great as they were, and that whole British scene, were slightly later aspirants). But in the 60s, while the Beatles et al. ruled the charts, there were kids picking up guitars and putting bands together whether or not they were fully “trained” musicians. Oftentimes the very lack of training made for a good result, and the Seeds encapsulated much of that sound, adding their own nuances to it. In the early 80s, American hardcore punk bands were doing something of the same thing. It was about sound and intensity (and speed), not about virtuoso playing. After a few years, when hardcore bands had learned to play better, the scene went in a different direction because people wanted to be more intricate. Some good stuff was still happening, but it wasn’t the same as that initial wave of Minor Threat, etc.

The idea being that at various points in time there must always be a return to the basics of rock’n’roll, which is volume and intensity and soul, and a handful of chords, without a lot of artifice. When the Seeds were at their best, that is what they represented.

Two Poems in Natural Bridge

The publications just keep coming lately. I’m on a lucky streak, I guess. The latest is two poems in Natural Bridge (ISSN 1525-9897), which is the literary magazine of the University of Missouri-St. Louis. This issue (No. 20, or 21 — both numbers are given on the cover — at any rate it’s Spring 2009) is guest-edited by the Irish poet Eamonn Wall. It features a few familiar names, such as Galway stalwarts Kevin Higgins and Susan DuMars, as well as a couple of other familiar Irish writers such as John Liddy. On a quick skim-through, Matt Rasmussen’s poem “Oh Stethoscope” also jumped out at me for its concise yet strange sense of language, and WCW-like short-line layout.

My two poems are titled “Dead Rabbits” and “Kells,” and these particular pieces continue the Irish or Irish-American themes of Ancestor Worship, I suppose, but from a different perspective. In time and place, if nothing else — yes yes y’all, the endless process of change called life. (I promise, though, I’ve been writing about other things than Ireland lately too....)

Order Natural Bridge through the first link above (although as of this posting they have yet to update their site), or for $8 from: Natural Bridge, Department of English, UMSL, One University Blvd., St. Louis, MO, 63121.

My Eugenio Montale

You didn’t know I could work my way through Italian, did you? Well, I have a translation or two of the great Italian poet Eugenio Montale in a brand-new anthology of his work entitled Corno Inglese, edited by Marco Sonzogni. The book is being launched on Wednesday 24 June 2009 at 6:30pm, at the Istituto Italiano di Cultura in Dublin, Ireland (located at 11 Fitzwilliam Square). Below is the full notice of the event from the Italian Cultural Institute’s website. Though this book-launch is free admission, due to limited seating places for this event must be reserved: RSVP (01) 662 1507 or 662 0509. (If you’re in Dublin on the 24th, please consider attending, and let me know how it goes.)

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Dr. Marco Sonzogni has assembled a team of illustrious translators to increase the awareness of the works of Eugenio Montale in English speaking countries. Their efforts have culminated in the volume Corno Inglese, published by the Joker Edizioni in Novi Ligure.

This elegant and precious collection (15x21, 270 pages) is destined, thanks to the value of the translations, to become an important travelling companion for the many students of Montale.

We are proud to have contributed to the realization of this worthy and considerable enterprise which collects the best of Montale’s poetry translated in English.

It is an exceptionally comprehensive, original and relevant collection, covering Montale’s entire oeuvre, from his early poems to the posthumous collections. As well as a printed edition, Corno Inglese will be published as an e-book.

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The collection of the translations included in this volume began in 1996, the centenary of Montale’s birth. The number of translators has expanded from a small constellation of stars (from Samuel Beckett to Paul Muldoon; from Robert Lowell to John Updike) to a galaxy of interpreters and interpretations from all over the world. This new anthology gathers a diverse band of translators who reveal the essence of Montale’s poetry.

The poems appear alphabetically by translator rather than in chronological order; challenge to convention is intended to engage the reader in a freer and fresher reading of each translation independently of the canon of the originals.

If there is “a Montale for everybody”, as fellow poet Giorgio Caproni has claimed, then Corno Inglese confirms this.

--Marco Sonzogni

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To purchase the book, go to the Joker Edizioni website (the first link, above). If you look for me in the index of translators, I am listed alphabetically under my name in Irish, Mícheál Ó Beigléinn.

Poem in the Suisun Valley Review

I have a poem in the new issue of the Suisun Valley Review (Spring 2009, Issue 26, ISSN 1945-7340). This journal is impressive, with a glossy cover and perfect-bound format. It is produced and edited by students at Solano Community College in California who take English 58, “a course in the contemporary literary magazine.” Sounds like a pretty progressive college, and it comes through in the magazine itself, which includes not only poetry and short fiction, but photography as well.

There’s some really great material in this issue, and it is well worth the $6 cover price. An immediate stand-out for me was a poem by Ashaki M. Jackson (who describes herself in her bio as “an ethnographer by proxy” and a social psychologist “in her spare time”). Her poem is “Revival,” and stylistically it reminded me a bit of myself. My own poem is “Thylacine,” and if I may say so it is one of my favorite poems that I’ve written in the last couple years. It takes up two pages of the journal; thanks to them for giving me the space....

Order the magazine at: Suisun Valley Review, English Department, Solano Community College, 4000 Suisun Valley Rd., Fairfield, CA 94535, USA, or query by email at: suisunvalleyreview@gmail.com. There’s also lots of info on their blog (the link above) and their MySpace page.

Léirmheas de Joe Steve Ó Neachtain i bhFeasta

Tá léirmheas a scríobh mé den leabhar filíochta is déanaí Joe Steve Ó Neachtain foilsithe san irisleabhar Feasta. Is é an t-eagrán atá i gceist ná Móreagrán na Bealtaine 2009 (Imleabhar 62, Uimhir 5, ISSN 0014-8946), agus tá sé ar díol sna siopaí leabhair i láthair na huaire. Príomhiris liteartha na Gaelige is ea Feasta, agus tá Pádraig Mac Fhearghusa ina eagarthóir air.

The scholar, Austin Clarke, and others

Poet and critic Robert Archambeau has posted a pleasant “end of semester” post on his Samizdat Blog. Toward the end of it, he includes Austin Clarke’s “The Scholar,” which I had not come across before (my knowledge of Clarke being shamefully somewhat less than it should be). But since I happen to be a big fan of Seán Ó Tuama’s anthology An Duanaire, 1600-1900: Poems of the Dispossessed (The Dolmen Press, 1981), I immediately recognized the Clarke piece as a loose version of “Aoibhinn Beatha an Scoláire,” the now-anonymous 17th-century Irish Gaelic poem. Archambeau highlights Clarke’s use of consonance, assonance, and half-rhymes, which is indeed pretty amazing. And it goes along with what I do know about Clarke, that he was very big on bringing the techniques and metres of Gaelic poetry over into English. Here is the original poem, followed by Clarke’s English version:

Aoibhinn beatha an sgoláire
bhíos ag déanamh a léighinn;
is follas díbh, a dhaoine,
gurab dó is aoibhne i nÉirinn.

Gan smacht ríogh ná rófhlatha
ná tighearna dá threise;
gan chuid cíosa ag caibidil,
gan moicheirgne, gan meirse.

Moichéirghe ná aodhaireacht
ní thabhair uadha choidhche,
’s ní mó do-bheir dá aire
fear ná faire san oidhche.

Do-bheir sé greas ar tháiplis,
is ar chláirsigh go mbinne,
nó fós greas eile ar shuirghe
is ar chumann mná finne.

Maith biseach a sheisrighe
ag teacht tosaigh an earraigh;
is é is crannghail dá sheisrigh
lán a ghlaice do pheannaibh.

*

The Scholar

Summer delights the scholar
With knowledge and reason.
Who is happy in hedgerow
Or meadow as he is?

Paying no dues to the parish,
He argues in logic
And has no care of cattle
But a satchel and stick.

The showery airs grow softer,
He profits from his ploughland
For the share of the schoolmen
Is a pen in hand.

When mid-day hides the reaping,
He sleeps by a river
Or comes to the stone plain
Where the saints live.

But in winter by the big fires,
The ignorant hear his fiddle,
And he battles on the chessboard,
As the land lords bid him.

Even if you don’t speak Irish, you can see that Clarke is attempting to imitate the form of the original, down to the loose or half-rhymes of lines 2 and 4 in each stanza, and the not-quite-regular pattern of alliteration. But what I found particularly interesting was what Clarke did with the translation itself, because he actually subverts the meaning of the poem to a great degree. For comparison, here is Thomas Kinsella’s rather more literal translation from An Duanaire, closely reflecting the original:

The Scholar’s Life

Sweet is the scholar’s life,
busy about his studies,
the sweetest lot in Ireland
as all of you know well.

No king or prince to rule him
nor lord however mighty,
no rent to the chapterhouse,
no drudging, no dawn-rising.

Dawn-rising or shepherding
never required of him,
no need to take his turn
as watchman in the night.

He spends a while at chess,
and a while with the pleasant harp
and a further while wooing
and winning lovely women.

His horse-team hale and hearty
at the first coming of Spring;
the harrow for his team
is a fistful of pens.

In the original, the emphasis is on the seeming ease of the scholar’s life, his relief from the drudgery of other occupations, the apparently privileged position he holds. The feeling is of spring, of art, of freedom, of sex, even a sense of hedonism, of libertinism in late-Gaelic society. It harks back to the role of the file, the poet, in classical Gaelic society, once on a par with the chief or king. But given the poem’s time period, probably the 17th c., maybe shortly after the disaster of Kinsale, perhaps there is a hint of a rose-tinted perspective here, or at least the unspoken sense that things were quickly to change. The poets who immediately followed, and up through the early 19th c. — Dáibhí Ó Bruadair, Aodhagán Ó Rathaille, Mícheál Óg Ó Longáin — decried their reduced circumstances and bristled at the poverty they, poets, had been reduced to (by English despotism).

Austin Clarke’s version of the poem is of his own time period (post-independence, ultra-conservative Ireland). The emphasis here is on summer as a temporary respite from the duties of the job. As Archambeau smartly points out, there is a “devastating turn at the end, when the easy flow of pastoral escapism comes to a screeching halt, and the scholar once again finds himself, as we all do, working for The Man.” This does not happen in the Gaelic or Kinsella’s version. In these, there is no rent at all; but in Clarke, as winter looms, the concluding line is “the land lords bid him.” In the original, chess is a pleasant diversion, but as Clarke has it, it is a battle. And there is no outward libertinism in Clarke’s version — the line about “winning lovely women” disappears altogether, it being the 1930s, the Catholic Church’s moral despotism holding sway in Irish society. There is no one but “the ignorant” to listen to the scholar now.

As the ideal life depicted in “Aoibhinn Beatha an Scoláire” is soon dissipated in the wind of 17th-c. English colonization, so is any hope of real intellectual freedom frustrated in 30s Ireland, in Clarke’s version. An interesting side note to this is that my father had a brief correspondence with Clarke in 1970-71. These two letters are now part of the collection of the University of Delaware Library, and the info on them can be seen here. If you scroll down, you will note that under the heading “Scope and Content Note” it lists “censorship in Ireland (including Clarke’s own work),” among other subjects.

On a review of a Ryan Adams poetry book

There’s a very funny review of the Ryan Adams poetry collection Infinity Blues (Akashic Books), published in the Independent Weekly, and here in their online version Indyweek.com. The piece, by Grayson Currin, is a great example of a reviewer tearing a book to shreds in a really smart, clever way. I have not read the collection myself, so I can’t judge whether all of the criticisms in the piece are warranted. To give the benefit of the doubt, perhaps they may not all be. As I understand it, Adams was something of a controversial figure in the Raleigh-Chapel Hill-Durham area, where his music career began with Whiskeytown, and there’s a chance that some of that could have tinged Currin’s piece (this is pure speculation too, as I don’t know much about Currin or his motivations). However, it seems quite possible that Currin is mostly right, because there is so much bad poetry out there that what he describes feels oh so familiar:

The poems are petulant, myopic and petty, as their star is either whining about the unbearable torture of life and love or regretting something he once felt.... What’s more, Infinity Blues chokes on its lazy, lavish use of postmodern devices: Adams tosses around unorthodox forms, line and character spacing, indulgent repetition, and inconsistent capitalization so often that they accomplish nothing except to render an exhausting read. Adams writes like an undergraduate who picked up volumes of Charles Bukowski, E.E. Cummings and William S. Burroughs at the used bookstore last semester, and now — back at home and missing his girlfriend — is trying those oversized clothes on for size over spring break....

Currin situates the publication of this book in the context of our contemporary society’s celebrity obsession, and wonders whether such work would have been published at all if Ryan Adams were not a well-known musician. It made me think about all the deserving poets out there who struggle to get any publisher at all, who don’t have the benefit of a music career to get them noticed. On the other hand, Akashic has published some great writers and is an important independent press. Akashic would no doubt beg to differ with Currin’s review, and I am guessing would stand by the Adams book as a valuable piece of literature in its own right. In a strange way, then, Currin’s piece ends up a recruiter to Infinity Blues itself: whether Akashic got it wrong, or Currin did, I can’t tell until I read it.

Pense Aqui No. 301

I have two poems in Pense Aqui No. 301, a mail-art and experimental poetry magazine published from Brazil. This issue includes collage/mail-art work from Brazil, Germany, Ireland, Canada, the U.S., Holland, Italy, Japan, Argentina, Serbia, with poems by David Stone, Adolf P. Shvedchikov (in Cyrillic font), and as mentioned, myself.

The editor, José Roberto Sechi, has posted photos of previous issues here.

Copies of the new issue may be obtained from:

José Roberto Sechi
Av. M29, N.° 2183 — Jd. São João
Rio Claro SP 13505-410
Brazil

(The above photo is from an earlier issue, No. 275.)

Otoliths 11 print edition

Otoliths issue 11 (Southern Spring) is now out in a print edition, in two books. I have three poems in Part One (“Angles,” “Poem Written at Work,” “July 12th”). Though the poems are online, the print edition is a great thing too. It can be ordered here.

The full details are:

156 pages, 6” x 9”, perfect binding, black and white interior ink.

Otoliths issue eleven, part one, contains work by Anny Ballardini, Halvard Johnson, dan raphael, Doug White, harry k stammer, Eileen R. Tabios, Cara Benson, Angela Genusa, Craig Rebele, Gregory Braquet, David-Baptiste Chirot, Vernon Frazer, Elizabeth Kate Switaj, Stephen C. Middleton, John Moore Williams, Marcia Arrieta, Raymond Farr, Felino Sorriano, Charles Mahaffee, Jeff Harrison, Steve Wing, Robert Gauldie, Philip Byron Oakes, Iain Britton, Thomas Fink, Thomas Fink and Maya Diablo Mason, Bill Drennan, J. D. Nelson, Julian Jason Haladyn, Charles Freeland, John M. Bennett, Jaie Miller, Naomi Buck Palagi, Tom Beckett, Paul Siegell, Geof Huth, Martin Edmond, Andrew Topel, Michael S. Begnal, and Michele Leggott.

Begnal featured in Eyewear

I am the latest Featured Poet (here) on Todd Swift’s blog-site and review, Eyewear. Swift’s piece includes my poem “The Fluctuations,” and I hope you will all check it out. Maybe even leave a comment or something. (The photo above is the one used there.)

A United Ireland?, Pt. 3

Since St. Patrick’s Day is a day arbitrarily linked to Ireland and all things Irish, I humbly offer some thoughts on the recent killings in the North of Ireland perpetrated by the “Real” IRA and the Continuity IRA:

Let me begin by stating that I am in favor of a united Ireland, and indeed have written about this in the past, here and here. In principle I do not believe in the partition of Ireland. The 1918 all-Ireland election, in which Sinn Féin won by a landslide, a result on which Ireland declared its independence, only to be rejected by the British government of the time, should have led to a free united Ireland, if said government was serious about democracy (apparently it wasn’t). Instead, it led to the War of Independence (a.k.a. the Anglo-Irish War) and partition.

The roots of the conflict in the North go back a long way (much farther than 1918 for that matter). In retrospect, did anyone really believe that a gerrymandered sectarian state (“Northern Ireland”), with “a Protestant parliament for a Protestant people” could work out? Or that it should? But, if we’re talking “should,” i.e. the principles of democracy and right and wrong, then there should be a united Ireland right now. But there isn’t, and thus, at least from the Irish republican perspective, there is a conflict. And thus there will in the interlude continue to be some group in Ireland, be it large or small at various points in time, willing to use violence to achieve the goal.

The question is (actually is twofold), is this an effective means of achieving the goal on the practical level, and is it morally right on the human level? In the 1990s, after three decades of the Provisional IRA prosecuting an armed campaign against British rule in the North, violence had finally come to been seen by Irish republicans (at least the majority of republicans as represented by Sinn Féin) to be a futile method of struggle at this time, in this generation. If anything, the armed struggle had actually become counterproductive to the goal it set for itself (a united Ireland), and I see absolutely no reason why it would be a different result this time around.

In terms of effective tactics, I think the recent dissident actions are setting back whatever (albeit minimal) progress toward a united Ireland we have had in the last number of years. I am frustrated by the pace of change too. But even if the dissidents were able to gain some popular support (which doesn’t seem likely at this point), and draw out the loyalist paramilitaries and the British army, what would be the result? Another stalemate, with people dying ultimately for no reason. I’m not a pacifist, but when people are dying for no reason then clearly it is wrong. And clearly it won’t bring about a united Ireland. So all that the dissidents have done and are doing is in vain, and totally pointless.

Recently, Des Dalton of Republican Sinn Féin laid out the dissidents’ reasoning, saying that

the “root cause” of the renewed violence in Northern Ireland [sic Yahoo] was Britain’s involvement on the island, which republicans want to unite.

“They’re one of the few EU members who continue to occupy the territory of another EU member. So, that will create abnormal relations between those two countries. So there will quite obviously be consequences of that,” he said.

He added: “There is a conflict in Ireland over many decades — centuries. The root cause is the British presence. So long as that exists there will be resistance to it.”

Most Irish republicans would not disagree with this analysis, but again the question is the response to it. Will the recent killings of the two British soldiers and the PSNI man help bring about a united Ireland? No. Quite the contrary. However, the dissidents hope to spark a crackdown, which would in turn perhaps create some sympathy for their movement. For example, the arrest of Colin Duffy brought “masked youths” onto the streets of Lurgan the other day. (There are suggestions that Duffy is being scapegoated, and if so then these riots could simply be expressions of justifiable anger). I’m not going to tell others how they should feel about the police, but will such a response really help to bring about a united Ireland, either? Probably not.

What will? The prospects are not immediately promising, and, again, progress has been frustratingly slow. I personally have no especial solution to the issue that hasn’t been elsewhere elucidated much better than I am able to here, I a mere poet. But there are some signs of hope.

Tim Pat Coogan recently published an opinion piece which attacked the dissident actions and again raised the issue of demographic change as a driving force toward a united Ireland. In this piece, he cited the Department of Education’s 2008-2009 Schools Census, which gives statistics showing that Catholics currently number 50.9% and Protestants 40.7%. “These schoolgoers have one thing in common,” writes Coogan. “They will all be entitled to vote when they reach 18. A Catholic majority therefore is not a Six-County electoral mirage. It is a clearly visible prospect on the political horizon. In the circumstances, there is a clear-cut political, as well as a moral, imperative for the republican extremists to allow life rather than death to achieve their objectives.”

There is also the economic argument, recently (12 February 2009) articulated by Gerry Adams, the president of Sinn Féin:

Irish unity is not just a dearly held republican aspiration. It is an economic imperative. In short, Irish unity makes economic sense. A considerable market of six million people exists on the island of Ireland. Over three million workers across Ireland have fuelled extraordinary economic growth in the past 10 years. Despite these developments, the continuing partition of Ireland creates impediments to economic development. These impediments cost individuals and businesses on a daily basis. They cost the island economy hundreds of millions each year. The identification and removal of these costs will create efficiencies, employment, wealth and opportunity across Ireland.... In future, Ireland north or south cannot afford to develop the island in a disjointed manner.... To ensure seamless and strategic economic development, the island of Ireland must plan and implement as one.

I think that this is true, and that both economic and demographic dynamics in Ireland will continue to push the two jurisdictions together, while hopefully in the meantime some trust will have been built between the two and various communities.

Again though, this is a slow process, and as an illustration of this, though they are the largest nationalist party in the North, in the South, Sinn Féin (using them a gauge) has only 11% support (according to the most recent poll I’ve seen). Though, it is quite possible that that number has more to do with SF as a party than with the South’s attitude toward a united Ireland, which a recent poll shows is generally favorable. Speaking realistically, however, there is on many levels widespread apathy toward the idea of a united Ireland in the South, and of course it is still outright opposed by unionists in the North (much fault has to be placed at the doorstep of the British government, who could be doing a lot more to act as persuaders to the unionists). If there was a magic, immediate solution, I guess I would be for it. But I have to admit that at the moment I can only say that time will have to take its course, just as time is on our side. Killing policemen etc. only slows the inevitable result and causes needless human suffering.