tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3084761118362537562024-03-13T17:07:17.245-04:00*Mnemosyne*Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.comBlogger161125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-2224199679955448032010-01-29T18:30:00.001-05:002010-01-29T18:30:00.084-05:00Feature: T.M. Göttl Day 6<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Memory of the Tree Falling Apart</span><br /><br />“A-bra-ham. Lin-coln.”<br />“My. He-ro.”<br /><br />The slow recitation, bad poetry,<br />I repeat into the receiver over and again,<br />these, the unlikely passwords to freedom.<br />I never thought it would begin like this.<br /><br />“Beige. Rug.”<br />“Black. Cof-fee.”<br /><br />They came with stones, boxes, reams of heavy-weight paper.<br />They came with box-cutters, paintbrushes. They came with<br />crowbars and chisels and afghan blankets.<br /><br />“A-bra-ham. Lin-coln.”<br />“Beige. Rug.”<br /><br />Remember the day when it wouldn’t rain?<br />That day, holy, just as every day is holy,<br />holy like the 60 watt bulb<br />hanging from a chain above my desk tonight.<br />I ran home with a brown paper lunch bag<br />full of Orion’s Belt,<br />because it was the only constellation<br />that I could name,<br />and constellations will remain wild<br />until you can call them by name.<br />Do you remember that day?<br />Shoving unbloomed buds of plastic roses<br />among your incense-lined shirt pocket.<br /><br />“Beige. Rug.”<br />“My. He-ro.”<br /><br />I hate to disappoint you<br />but now that it’s over, there won’t be any songs<br />about rainbows and fireflies, no<br />blossoming love sonnets about German chocolate.<br />I want to be held in the arms of the sun,<br />and I want to sleep in the arms of the rain.<br /><br />Let it burn, that early morning late night fast food poetry,<br />let it burn.<br /><br />“Black. Cof-fee.”<br />“A-bra-ham. Lin-coln.”<br /><br />And where are the pigeons and the war cries?<br />What about the ancient Hebrew psalms<br />escaping from the countertop stereo?<br />Who are these people, pushing lightening anthems<br />of mountains and lighthouses<br />into a six-by-eight window, while<br />the faucet leaks a gentle copper cadence.<br />I don’t want to step back<br />into that puddle of purple vertigo.<br />But for today, we dance. Today,<br />we dance.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">© T.M. Göttl</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: If you could meet any famous writer/poets or historical figure from the past or present who might they be? And why would you like to meet them particularly?</span><br /><br />A: Two of my literary idols immediately come to mind. The first, the late Czeslaw Milosz, who is hands-down my favorite poet ever. I discovered his work in the summer of 2005, while getting new tires put on my car. The shop was going to take 3 hours to do the work, so I took a walk down the street to the shopping centers in the area to kill some time. Lo and behold, the temporary location for the Medina Library (which was being remodeled at the time) was taking up residence behind one of the shopping centers, so I strolled in. I turned down the literature aisle, Milosz’s collected works popped out at me, I grabbed it, sat down at a table, and the next thing I knew, three hours had passed. I went home, immediately thinking that I wanted to write this man a letter and tell him how his words had touched me, but I was crushed to learn that he’d died the year before, on my birthday. Really, I’d just like the chance to tell him thank you.<br /><br />The second literary figure I’d like to spend time with is Neil Gaiman. I spent an hour waiting in line in the cold to hear him speak at the Cleveland Library this year, and he was incredible. I already loved his work--Neverwhere changed my life. But listening to him, I felt like he was speaking directly to me, even though there were a thousand people there. And even though he’s a novelist and graphic novelist, he spoke very passionately about poetry and the role it played in his life.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: What are your favorite rock bands?</span><br /><br />A: Minus my local favorites…U2, seeing them live was a religious experience for me, and I have plans to see them again this summer. Friends have turned me on to a lot of not-so-mainstream artists, like Dave Barnes, Matt Wertz, Andy Davis, Trevor Hall, Griffin House, Katie Herzig, Nathan Lee, Tyrone Wells. I recently got more into Prince. I enjoy Coldplay. Marc Broussard. Regina Spektor. I grew up on a combination of classical music (which made me a fan of Tchaikovsky) and the music my dad listened to, like CSNY, The Doors, Harry Chapin, Elton John…but I still consider myself pretty “culturally inept”, a term my best friend in high school coined for me, and then proceeded to make it her mission to educate me in pop culture. It’s an ongoing process.<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S2Jjqay4NpI/AAAAAAAAAYI/9GO_aRYHDNY/s1600-h/brown_beige_food_8842_l.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 309px; height: 300px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S2Jjqay4NpI/AAAAAAAAAYI/9GO_aRYHDNY/s400/brown_beige_food_8842_l.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5432013680960616082" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><a href="http://www.everystockphoto.com/photo.php?imageId=8842">Study in Hot Chocolate</a></span>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-55805056210315967402010-01-28T18:30:00.000-05:002010-01-28T18:30:00.313-05:00Feature: T.M. Göttl Day 5<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Today,</span><br /><br />in a fit of desperate, doily-embellished passion, all chrysanthemums and body-strewn streets, I hammered out sixhundredwords to the worship of the muse, the dedication of the monk and nun, sixhundredwords that only I could offer up, the only words I had to offer up, to a grey and disinterested deity, such inkandpaper lips and tongues that would never chance the grace of a pontiff’s eyes, the bishop’s mitre, the scholar’s hood, such lies and stolen requiems to only ever curl in the corners, shamed into shedding their colored plumage and their ornamented claws, trading a quasi-reliquaried existence, their own familiarity, in exchange for the long-fingered extraction of fear as it climbs into beds, between covers, absorbed into the threads before sailors’ wives even bleached them into linen sheets, the sapling fluff and seed that laughs in the loop of every technological firing, each extermination closer, one toe-length beyond a thirsting howl, pulling year after year from ages, ticking slowly upwards in the evaporation of the emperor-owned water clocks, younger hands and younger clothing, rolling, rolling, rolling down the satin hills and clover, the chalk-lined walls, the mason jar serving to germinate stray grains of sunlight, the stalks budding white-hot coral-colored husks, peeling, sloughing off hardened excuses, revealing, at last, the cooling, breathing honesty.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><br />© T.M. Göttl</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: You’ve also written lyrics for music. Is that similar or different from writing straight poetry for you? And where can we find your work?</span><br /><br />A: Terrifying! I adamantly do.not.rhyme, so the first time a friend asked if I’d put some words to his music, I balked. It ended up being a fun project, because I figured there were no expectations on me—although it took probably six months before my thoughts came together and I came up with something adequate. That first lyric-writing venture was “Funky Chiropractor,” in collaboration with Zach. It was more of a joke really, which worked out for me, because just about anything I rhyme tends to fall in the not-so-serious category.<br /><br />A more challenging bit came this past year when another local musician and friend, David Ullman, asked if I’d like to collaborate with him and write some lyrics. David has a very different style than Zach, and I knew the ridiculous would be out on this one. But David and I are both very happy with the results and what each of us has brought to the piece to make it something very special—a song called “Everyone is Somebody Else”.<br /><br />Thus far, neither piece has been recorded (except for various live versions of Chiropractor that are out there on YouTube and my MySpace page). We’ll see what happens. Now and again, I’ve written something that’s song-like and sent it off to a songwriter-friend to see what becomes of it. No other finished results yet. But again, we’ll see what becomes of it all ?Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-37749931308140295662010-01-27T18:27:00.002-05:002010-01-27T18:31:41.092-05:00Feature: T.M. Göttl Day 4<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Heartbreak and an Empty Hotel Room: Tax Day</span><br /><br />Today, the morning broke, from black to grey,<br />just like every other morning<br />on every other day<br />in this town where the noon-time scarecrows<br />burn away all the hope<br />by afternoon, along with all the iron<br />and a canvas of fumes.<br /><br />I heard the dwarrows in the woods,<br />conferencing with faeries, and howling:<br />“We only have two options:<br />the slow crawl of the coward,<br />or the shotgun exit of the brave!”<br /><br />A blue dove<br />sat above my head,<br />mocking me from an aspen limb,<br />because I mumbled about building roses,<br />while holding a rusty, eleven-year-old knife.<br />And I’ve been holding that knife for eleven years,<br />just in case I needed it again.<br /><br />Because you might see silver spiders<br />falling across my face,<br />but there’s no magic me. I’ll never see<br />Ezekiel’s green-wingéd angels, and I’m afraid<br />to break the silence of your stone.<br />I want to be everywhere tonight.<br />I want to eat dinner in an attic with your ex-girlfriend,<br />reading tarot cards and talking about<br />anonymous movie theaters.<br />I want to climb the windows<br />of every downtown office, arms opened up<br />to the honey waiting on your fingers,<br />to the golden eggs, and the golden eyes,<br />and the golden halos, kicking around your ankles.<br /><br />But mostly, I want to sit<br />at the top of a cast-iron spiral,<br />watching, down,<br />because even when you’re not around,<br />they’re talking about<br />NPR, and the Mayan calendar, and<br />the last of the American Bison.<br />Why can’t you just see me?!<br /><br />See me!<br />drowning in the<br />afternoon caldera<br />of wildflower wine!<br />There are no more timepieces,<br />pulling fleece from the irony<br />of an apple blossom rain,<br />the warp and the weft of a diamond riot.<br /><br />See me!<br />with the asphalt and quartz in my hair and<br />under my palms, cracked,<br />like the bell of an ivory horn,<br />sounding the call of the vagabond messengers.<br /><br />See me!<br />falling to my knees<br />because no one will hold me up<br />anymore.<br />You never learned how to bring your own sun,<br />so how much brighter must I shine<br />before you can see?<br /><br />See me.<br /><br />And tell me, when will you write a song for me?<br />About how brave and stupid I was on Good Friday?<br />About how I scheduled a resurrection<br />while the swallows and pigeons shot arrows across<br />the unfiltered sky?<br />About the clover above my head?<br /><br />I’m leaving, tonight.<br />I filled the back seat of my car<br />with sleep and doorways, but no ceilings.<br />I tucked Nike’s crown under my arm,<br />scratching psalms into copper collars, and<br />chasing blue lights down the highway,<br />chasing my enemies, chasing every<br />herald and beacon, and running with the army<br />of blue-coated angels. Just<br />see me.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">© T.M. Göttl</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Q&A</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: What aspects of poetry and its performance/sharing do you like and which do you fear or dislike?</span><br /><br />A: I think performance and presentation are just as important as the writing of the piece. Poetry existed long before the written word, and I believe it still is, at least in part, intended to be an oral tradition. That doesn’t negate the value of the word on the page, but too often, the way that a piece is read and presented, I feel, takes a back seat to the writing of it. I think all art should be experiential, for the creator and for the audience. If you can’t climb inside of your art—be it a painting, song, or poem—and take your audience by the hand and invite them to climb inside and dance around in it with you, I believe you lack as an artist. I know that I don’t always achieve that, but that’s the ideal for which I strive in my work.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: You are sold out of your recent poetry book… or nearly sold out. Can you give us an idea of what you’ve got planned for your future projects? Any sneak peeks you might be able to share?</span><br /><br />A: I’m in the process of compiling a manuscript for a second full-length collection that I’m hoping we’ll be able to put out in the first half of 2010. Other than that, I don’t want to say too much, for fear of having to eat my words later. Stay tuned for now!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: You’ve recently taken on some journalistic writing. Do you find it different from doing poetry? And do you enjoy it? Does it help or compliment your other writing or is it very different for you?</span><br /><br />A: My journalistic pieces and opinion essays came naturally, because I’m already attending all these poetry events around Northeast Ohio, so it made sense to write about them. I think it helps keep my writing fresh. Blogging can get sloppy, but when you’re putting something out there for someone besides your friends to read, you take more care. Poetry helps with that—paying attention to word choice, getting the idea across in as short a space as possible. But of course, it’s very different. I haven’t done much straightforward writing since college, and it’s good to keep those muscles in shape again.Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-66695415710320459062010-01-26T17:29:00.004-05:002010-01-26T17:56:03.070-05:00Feature: T.M. Göttl Day 3<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Time</span><br /><br />Time, and the march<br />of army boots,<br />and metal chairs, and the<br />midnight howl of a panther train.<br /><br />Time, and the sea lord<br />calling back the herds,<br />and the seventh breaking<br />of the hardwood stair.<br /><br />Time, and a white coat,<br />cigarettes, and coffee.<br /><br />Time, and the refrigerated<br />cellular automotive<br />facsimile liquid crystal<br />satellite malfunction.<br /><br />Time, and the lack of confidence,<br />reflected in faded<br />cathedral glass.<br /><br />Time, and aluminum eagle wings,<br />and the painted skydivers, and<br />the telescoping highways.<br /><br />Time, and a minted peace<br />and a pinecone rustle,<br />and a chipmunk soul.<br /><br />Time, because everyone’s written<br />a poem about heartbreak<br />and an empty hotel room<br /><br />Time, and the concrete lions, and<br />telephone poles, and the copper, copper<br />saxophone strings.<br /><br />Time, and the burning pages,<br />the empty bottles, the distorted<br />static music. Time, and the black keys,<br />white keys, gray keys, colored keys,<br />computer keys, car keys,<br />house keys, major keys,<br />minor keys.<br /><br />Time, and the red ink, and the<br />black water.<br /><br />Time through a glass,<br />around your neck,<br />under your feet, and<br />in your pocket.<br /><br />Time, and a house without ceilings<br />a front lawn full of hands,<br />and a basement<br />full of feet<br />and folded prayers.<br /><br />Time, and a red, paper kite,<br />hunting through the starshine.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">© T.M. Göttl (previously published in a <a href="http://gallery.poetshaven.com/singlepage.php?html=bookcontents.php&section=19&page=1">Saturday Night with the Poet's Haven PodCast</a> and in <a href="http://www.buffalozef.net/artists/tmgottl/writings.html"><i>Stretching the Window</i>, (c) 2007</a>)</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: Following on that question (yesterday): where do you find your inspiration for your poetry?</span><br /><br />A: The cop-out, canned answer that everyone gives is “everywhere”, but it’s true. I find that a lot of poems begin to take shape while I’m driving, or late at night in those moments before you fall asleep but can’t because a poem is keeping you awake. Or, while I’m driving late at night.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: Can you tell us a little bit about your writing style. Where and how you like to write. Your favorite workspace, etc…</span><br /><br />A: I carry notebooks and pens everywhere. If someone says something in conversation, if I see or hear something that brings an image to mind, if a word or phrase pops into my head and I think “I need to use that in a poem”, I jot it down. I have notebooks full of fragments. I used to have loose slips of paper everywhere—which still happens from time to time but not as often—which were a nightmare to keep track of. Eventually, I’ll go back into those notebooks with a particular idea in mind and pull out all the fragments that apply, and sit down at the computer to edit it all together in something more or less coherent. And then, of course, there are the rare pieces that flow out in almost perfectly completed form within fifteen minutes. Those are blessings from the muses.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: What are 3 things you really think you’d like to try in your lifetime you’ve not done yet?</span><br /><br />A: This sounds like a college entrance essay question! Traveling to Alaska has been a lifelong dream. I’d like to climb a mountain (hiking that is—if pulleys and other equipment were required, I think I’d be scared). I’ve desperately wanted to go out west and see the national parks for years now.<br /><br />Other than that, I’d really just like to be able to drive around the country, reading and writing. If I could make that work for a living, I think I’d be happy. There’s a special kind of joy for me in being able to go somewhere far away with a certain purpose in mind.<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S19yikNp-_I/AAAAAAAAAYA/duoMp3FE3dg/s1600-h/clock_fashion_girl_224639_l.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 222px; height: 296px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S19yikNp-_I/AAAAAAAAAYA/duoMp3FE3dg/s400/clock_fashion_girl_224639_l.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5431185613794180082" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.everystockphoto.com/photo.php?imageId=224639">fashion clock 3</a>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-16856072720264292202010-01-25T19:51:00.003-05:002010-01-26T17:33:32.761-05:00Feature: T.M. Göttl Day 2<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Out of the Desert</span><br /><br />A liar and a cheater,<br />like a crayon-painted road sign<br />melting waxy puddles through<br />tomorrow afternoon, I<br />never quite believed<br />in men with wings—<br />big and great golden eagle wings,<br />growing from their shoulder blades—<br />no. I never quite believed,<br />although I said I did.<br /><br />Because I always watched my brothers,<br />carrying the weather on their backs,<br />past the blue welding light,<br />scouring the steam-loving cranes<br />until they burned and bled and<br />cracked all the gunmetal nightlights,<br />lifting iron ladders, girders<br />crossed into star-shaped flowers<br />worshiping a dead and contrived<br />second sun.<br /><br />And I said no.<br /><br />I painted neon pink and silver<br />over all the attic drywall,<br />called it Heaven, climbed those eighteen stairs<br />every afternoon at four o’clock,<br />said my prayers, almost<br />thought I heard the saints<br />talking back to me.<br /><br />And then I stood on the crystal jukebox<br />declaring, in forty different tongues<br />like a knighted prophet in<br />leather sandals and a corduroy tunic, that<br />yes, I believe<br />men can grow<br />glossy wings from their backs,<br />crossing canyons and vaulting the rapids.<br /><br />I had to believe.<br />But I never quite believed.<br /><br />And the doubt? I knew it,<br />a chewing nest of carpenter vermin<br />drinking the ink out of prayer books<br />and clipping black eyes to the curtains.<br /><br />They chased me from the cathedral,<br />from the railroad, from the statehouse.<br />They chased me from the school and<br />from the grocery, from the park.<br /><br />They chased me to an old garage<br />underneath an old factory.<br />And there, without fish-tail testimonials<br />or a porcelain-faced audience,<br />there, I found<br />a man, with wings,<br />who showed me how<br />to find my own, auburn and burgundy-feathered,<br /><br />crossing lakes and vaulting<br />the heroic moon I’d never met.<br />And finally, finally, I believed.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">© T.M. Göttl</span> <span style="font-size:85%;">(<a href="http://gallery.poetshaven.com/singlepage.php?html=bookcontents.php&section=19&page=3">previously published in a Saturday Night with the Poet's Haven PodCast</a> and in <a href="http://www.buffalozef.net/artists/tmgottl/writings.html"><i>Stretching the Window</i>, (c) 2007</a>)</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: </span> <span style="font-weight: bold;">When did you discover you loved to write? And is this something you’ve done since you were young or something you discovered as you got older?</span><br /><br />A: I actually started writing creatively in kindergarten or first grade. I don’t know if it’s still in existence, but there was something called the Young Authors, where kids in grade school could write, illustrate, bind and submit a “book” that they’d written. Writing has always been with me.<br /><br />I started writing poetry in high school—the angsty kind of stuff that teens write. Then in college, I took a poetry workshop, and it completely altered my approach to poetry writing and the way I think about it. It’s been with me ever since.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: You have a very deep affection for little furry creatures. Where does that come from? Do you think maybe you may have been a squirrel in you a past life? </span><br /><br />A: The squirrel affinity actually grew out of a conversation several years ago when I was trying to explain the way that I think in comparison with a squirrel. A squirrel will run half-way across the street, hesitate and turn back. He might eventually get to his destination, but it takes him a while to get up the nerve to go all the way. It seemed to be a good metaphor for me at the time, and the squirrels have kind of stuck with me.<br /><br />I also had pet rabbits when I was younger, and I have a Syrian, long-haired hamster now, named Zora.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q: You have very clear themes that appear in your writing and poetry. Can you tell us a little about that?</span><br /><br />A: I’d like to think my readers would be better at telling you about that. So often I’ve heard that artists are the worst people to interpret their own work, and I know it’s true in my case. But since you asked, I’ll give it a quick attempt.<br /><br />The most common response I’ve had to my writing, especially in Stretching the Window, is that I’m “searching”. For a while now, I’ve felt like I’ve been in a very transitional phase of my life, and whether consciously or unconsciously, that’s worked its way into my poetry. And I think most people can relate to that. We are all searching for something, because if we’d found it, we wouldn’t have a reason to be here anymore.Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-85250216218298946492010-01-24T18:30:00.001-05:002010-01-24T19:02:42.087-05:00Feature: T.M. Göttl Day 1This week's feature is T. M. Göttl. T.M. is a very talented open mic performer in the Cleveland area and a poet we admire very much here at *Mnemosyne*. We know you'll love her too! Q&A questions provided by our co-editor, Christina Brooks. :-)<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S1xZ1m__JuI/AAAAAAAAAX4/u78NRX2DJpU/s1600-h/2Gottle.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 219px; height: 292px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S1xZ1m__JuI/AAAAAAAAAX4/u78NRX2DJpU/s400/2Gottle.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5430314028238841570" border="0" /></a><br /><br />BIO<br /><br />T.M. Göttl is a member of the Buffalo ZEF Creative Community, writing and performing her poetry throughout her homestate of Ohio, and beyond. The first time she entered a slam-style poetry competition, she won first place, and she won a Wayne College Regional Writing Award, as well as a Franklin-Christof Poetry Prize. T.M. Göttl's work has appeared in numerous online and print publications, including The Hessler Street Fair Anthology, Deep Cleveland, The Mill, The Poet's Haven, Opium Poetry, as well as appearances on 91.3 WAPS The Summit and 89.7 WOSU radio stations. Her first full-length collection, <a href="http://www.buffalozef.net/artists/tmgottl/">Stretching the Window</a>, was published by Buffalo ZEF in 2008.<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br />Cheese<br /><br />This is a poem about cheese.<br />Parmesan, camembert,<br />brie, pepper jack, provolone.<br /><br />Grilled cheese, string cheese,<br />Swiss cheese, shredded cheese,<br />sliced cheese, E-Z cheese<br />(which never had any integrity anyway),<br />macaroni and cheese,<br />the cheese that my vegan friends<br />don’t eat anymore.<br /><br />All the commercials<br />telling you to buy cheese,<br />to go to the store, aisle after aisle,<br />carefully selecting wheels and blocks,<br />reading the labels to indulge our<br />may-contain-trace-amounts-of-<br />Made-in-China-fears.<br /><br />Because this poem<br />is also about failure,<br />about trusting too much to the people<br />who let us eat poison, who let our children<br />eat poison, and who then sell us little<br />every-colored pills that may cause<br />liver failure, blindness, cancer,<br />blood clots, hang nails, acne,<br />birth defects, and flu-like symptoms.<br />But don’t worry; your sinuses<br />will be perfectly clear.<br /><br />Because this isn’t about cheese at all.<br />This is about all the addictions<br />to alcohol, nicotine,<br />coffee, tea, television,<br />online gaming, YouTube,<br />MySpace, romance novels,<br />Chapstick, The Home Shopping Network,<br />and Facebook.<br /><br />And meanwhile,<br />there’s a lotus blossom<br />pounding on the front door<br />because the neighbors all<br />gathered on the front lawn,<br />circle-singing Gregorian chant and changing<br />all the words to the Creed.<br />The demons crowd our voicemail boxes,<br />and we throw away stardust with<br />the junk mail and the ads.<br />We don’t bother noticing<br />when the trees stopped singing,<br />when the streets filled with slush,<br />and the skies filled with gray.<br />We count words as if they mattered<br />anymore than a grade point average mattered<br />after graduation.<br /><br />Meanwhile, the pendulum swings,<br />a pine tree ticks like a<br />falling clock,<br /><br />and I’ve been lying.<br /><br />Because this poem never really was<br />about cheese.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">© T.M. Göttl (<a href="http://gallery.poetshaven.com/singlepage.php?html=bookcontents.php&section=19&page=17">previously published in a Saturday Night With the Poet's Haven PodCast</a>)</span>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-60438435965439536072010-01-24T09:02:00.003-05:002010-01-24T09:22:22.229-05:00Marc Mannheimer's Feature Links<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S1xTUs2pJ4I/AAAAAAAAAXw/T0Dmb3GxhCA/s1600-h/BIO+Pic.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 308px; height: 231px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S1xTUs2pJ4I/AAAAAAAAAXw/T0Dmb3GxhCA/s400/BIO+Pic.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5430306865804814210" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Marc's Feature Links<br /><br />Day 1<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-marc-mannheimer-day-1.html">Intro / BIO / Poem: "open mic night"</a><br /><br />Day 2<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-marc-mannheimer-day-2.html">Poem: "the no blues blues" / Q&A / Photo</a><br /><br />Day 3<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-marc-mannheimer-day-3.html">Poem: "tandem" / Q&A/ Photo</a><br /><br />Day 4<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-marc-mannheimer-day-4.html">Poem: "stolen illumination" / Poem: "my scream" / Q&A / Photo</a><br /><br />Day 5<a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-marc-mannheimer-day-5.html"><br />Poem: "the crust" / Q&A / Photo</a><br /><br />Day 6<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-marc-mannheimer-day-6.html">Poem: "feel it" / Q&A / Photo</a><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br />Find Marc elsewhere on the net:<br /><br /><a href="http://marcmannheimer.blogspot.com/">Catastrophe and Bliss</a>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-57937093372915043732010-01-17T17:25:00.001-05:002010-01-17T17:26:30.818-05:00Another Week in HiatusOur apologies for being on Hiatus once again, this time due to a death in the family. Thank you so much for your patience. We will be back next week with the talented T.M. Göttl.Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-51832631765739180562010-01-15T18:30:00.000-05:002010-01-15T18:30:01.075-05:00Feature: Marc Mannheimer Day 6<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />feel it</span><br /><br />total acceptance<br />of the moment<br />and everything in it,<br />feel it,<br />know it,<br />glow it alive,<br />inside out with your heart,<br />blow the flame<br />into the glass,<br />make it drip sweat<br />and sear with end of steel rod,<br />seeing red, sparks golden,<br />metal molten,<br /><br />and blame no outside agency<br />no person<br />or institution<br />or idea<br />or convention for what you find here;<br />blame nothing,<br />just be with it,<br />blazing light into your secret, sodden places<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"> © Marc Mannheimer</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br />Q: How has poetry changed your life?<br /><br />A: In a sense, it’s lined up all of my inner processes, or it has at times. It’s put the emotional and intellectual and sexual and spiritual all in synch.<br /><br />Q: What is your view on self publishing?<br /><br />A: I think I’m kind of biased on this question, because the only books I’ve done have been self-published. Well, the two books were self-created, and then printed by a printer at cost. It was suggested to me a couple of years ago by a local poet that the way to go at first is to print up a whole bunch of poetry and staple it together and get myself out there. That was the inspiration for the two books. Looking back, I think that was pretty sage advice.<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oPWPJZqmI/AAAAAAAAAXo/N_rFjiwpFT4/s1600-h/100_0228.JPG"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 294px; height: 221px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oPWPJZqmI/AAAAAAAAAXo/N_rFjiwpFT4/s400/100_0228.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5425165575818685026" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">Photo </span><span style="font-size:85%;">© Marc Mannheimer</span>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-38154801321668942492010-01-14T18:30:00.000-05:002010-01-14T18:30:00.251-05:00Feature: Marc Mannheimer Day 5<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />the crust</span><br /><br />the plains,<br />where the wind and<br />the wild coyote<br />meet in Outbreath,<br />crow, crack of night,<br />hackle,<br />HOWL –<br />the crust of the Earth knows these places.<br /><br />and the tides that sweep<br />over and retreat<br />that wash over us,<br />inside of us,<br />granting release<br />from our silt, from our shock,<br />they are known in their own way as well.<br /><br />we know not where we go;<br />we see not the underlying,<br />its movements, its rising even unto malady,<br />nor its Holographic healing,<br />the science for our times.<br /><br />but we will be pushed<br />as far as a man or woman can be pushed,<br />into the plains to fend for ourselves,<br />into the sea to sink or swim;<br />we will feign escape what the crust<br />offers us as fate<br />--the path of least resistance<br />--the path of insurmountable struggle,<br />--the path of waiting, of letting go and letting be,<br />of grace and singing for the unsheltered.<br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><br />© Marc Mannheimer </span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br />Q: Who are your favorite writers/poets?<br /><br />Well, my proxy teacher Natalie Goldberg. I’ve been digesting her “Writing Down the Bones” for months. But poets? – William Carlos Williams may be my all-time favorite, Kenneth Rexroth, Pablo Neruda, Lorca, Dylan Thomas. I had never read Dylan Thomas until a couple of months ago. He surprised me by being so modern.<br /><br />Q: How do you deal with writer's block (any tricks to keep yourself writing)?<br /><br />A: By reading Natalie Goldberg, by doing her free-writing exercise. I have a history of mother-transferences – I think I need a Mom to tell me it’s okay, and to just sit down and write a page. “No editing!”<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oOar2DQHI/AAAAAAAAAXg/ocmA8Bwawbc/s1600-h/100_0189.JPG"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 330px; height: 247px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oOar2DQHI/AAAAAAAAAXg/ocmA8Bwawbc/s400/100_0189.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5425164552730001522" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">Photo</span> <span style="font-size:85%;">© Marc Mannheimer </span>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-41815614832513949432010-01-13T18:30:00.002-05:002010-01-24T09:12:26.655-05:00Feature: Marc Mannheimer Day 4<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />stolen illumination</span><br /><br />dharma readings,<br />heart murmurs, heart bleatings,<br />blaze of sunlight,<br />hard through<br />balcony doorway<br />harrowing down<br />on my two close friends --<br />Aloe and white African violet plants,<br />petals and potions,<br />stalks and stolen moments,<br />beauty and chastity and clarity<br />shining back up out the doorway,<br />filling the face of the sun.<br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><br />© Marc Mannheimer</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >my scream</span><br /><br />my scream these days<br />is -- RRAUGGGGGHHHHHH!,<br /><br />I am frustrated that this life<br />is not a straight line<br />but a tender<br />self-disassembly.<br /><br />I just want to walk to the horizon,<br />I just want to take a walk,<br />enjoy a nice walk<br />to a nice sunset,<br />or to a nice sumptuous meal,<br />or to bed with a someone akin to desirable.<br /><br />but we're not here to<br />get what we want,<br />are we?<br />some of the time?<br />weeeellll, never what you REALLY want!<br /><br />"take yourself apart --<br />your pride,<br />your lust,<br />your anger,<br />your selfishness;<br /><br />examine each one<br />and understand how<br />it builds fortresses<br />around your true fulfillment."<br /><br />well, excuse me,<br />but your “true fulfillment”<br />is cramping the shit out of my<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">true fulfillment.</span><br /><br />for me, I'd rather walk a straight line<br />any straight line,<br />a straight line into a brick wall, let’s say,<br />or into heavy traffic,<br />or round and round in circles<br />until they come to get me.<br />RRRRRAUUUUUGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!<br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><br />© Marc Mannheimer</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br />Q: Do you have rituals or habits when you write?<br /><br />A: More like a compulsion. I will often read a page of a meditation book and then write a poem, read a page of something else, write, etc. Though I enjoy writing most when it’s spontaneous, when a thought hits me or something I see strikes me and I pull out the notebook and write.<br /><br />Q: Where does your inspiration come from? (Family? Nature? Music? Friends? Famous Poets?)<br /><br />A: Nature, street scenes, friends, my schmo-mantic life (love-never-found), my own psychological processes, and, yes, famous writers.<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oNF2kjy3I/AAAAAAAAAXY/GFG1rLcJix0/s1600-h/100_0101.JPG"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 307px; height: 231px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oNF2kjy3I/AAAAAAAAAXY/GFG1rLcJix0/s400/100_0101.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5425163095320546162" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><br />Photo © Marc Mannheimer</span>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-11419528407218527172010-01-12T18:30:00.001-05:002010-01-12T18:30:00.147-05:00Feature: Marc Mannheimer Day 3<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />tandem</span><br /><br />two<br />cottonwood seeds,<br />floating,<br />in tandem, arm in arm,<br />attracted by<br />my resolution to try something<br />daring<br />for a change;<br /><br />and I watch them land<br />in my palm,<br />and me,<br />I had been dreaming all day<br />of finding her.<br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><br />© Marc Mannheimer</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br />Q: Tell us something about yourself that not many people know about you. :-)<br /><br />A: Well, I used to pick up garbage as a hobby. It started in college. I might spend an hour wandering and putting stuff into trash bags.<br /><br />Q: When did you first have an interest in poetry?<br /><br />A: After I had a psychological crash in 2003. I decided then to get out of my shell and create and socialize and work. I wanted to write more music and do open mics, but was too nervous to do that. So I turned some of those songs into poems and began slowly getting into writing and then doing readings.<br /><br />Q: Where do you write? Is Ambiance Important?<br /><br />A: Ambiance is very important for me, although I have to say I’ve been writing a great deal in a certain corporate coffee shop. It’s quiet and homey there. But I write in a small group of settings – I’ve written about 30 poems on the rapid transit landing or on the rapid itself, but most in coffee shops, which can be a hub of ideas. I also like to write at my kitchen table, especially when I am working (I am a hotline operator – there can be up to 15 minutes or so between calls). If I go to the park, I always write there.<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oLeoFOiSI/AAAAAAAAAXQ/DF2zQ_1Ehyw/s1600-h/100_0158.JPG"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 327px; height: 246px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oLeoFOiSI/AAAAAAAAAXQ/DF2zQ_1Ehyw/s400/100_0158.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5425161321904507170" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">Photo © Marc Mannheimer</span>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-1047389985474714872010-01-11T18:30:00.000-05:002010-01-11T18:30:01.043-05:00Feature: Marc Mannheimer Day 2<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />the no blues blues</span><br /><br />no blues<br />is not good blues,<br /><br />-- never taking<br />the reach<br />for that<br />cinnamon and sugar sweet<br />romance,<br />that one in twenty chance<br />to get your ass out on the dancefloor and dance,<br />to inject your mind with that sickly swoony<br />illness that fills your thoughts<br />with her adorable likeness<br /><br />no, no blues<br />means and means no more<br />than --<br />you never stood to<br />lose<br />nor gain<br />a thing...<br /><br />not to die or live<br />receive or give the sunlight of your love,<br />not to exercise your heart,<br />the muscle that's strongest<br />and strangest in your life-vessel,<br /><br />and now that you lie<br />at the end of your lonely days<br />in a bed in a nursing facility,<br />ossified, fossilized, refusing to participate<br />in what little life you have available to you,<br />your heart could stand to run around the block a few times,<br />to be stepped on, cheated on, to soar with wings,<br />to open and close,<br />to be broken and healed and broken again whole --<br /><br />to open<br />and close......<br /><br />.......and there is a little old lady who sits in the back of the dining room<br />and she has her eye on you<br />and there is a little old lady who sits in the dining room<br /><br />and you see her once<br />and something flutters,<br />but no, "No! No! NO!! NOOOO!!!"<br /><br />and that is the no-nonsense news<br />you can use or abuse or project and accuse<br />-- that is my future should I choose,<br />that my friends is the no blues blues.<br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><br />© Marc Mannheimer</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Q&A</span><br /><br />Q: How does your spirituality influence your writing/poetry.<br /><br />A: I often seek to uncover the magical in the ordinary in my poetry. Because of my interest in the world mystical traditions, I’ve come to feel that the “God-stuff” – call it Chi or Shakti or Shekinah, etc., has manifested this Universe out of itself. So the magic I seek, to me, is really there, not the product of an imaginative poet.<br /><br />Q: Do you have any other artistic/creative interests/talents?<br /><br />A: I am a musician -- have been since I was a teen. My first writing experiences, in fact, were writing songs. I also dabble in drawing -- from any old picture I can get my hands on.<br /><br />Q: How do you define poetry in general?<br /><br />A: Poetry is a creative impulse expressing things seen, felt, intuited and thought in words that are "ordered" according to ones aesthetic sense. One develops that sense from reading other poetry, but eventually falls into a sense of rhythm that is his or her own.<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oJy9pzsTI/AAAAAAAAAXI/EAsm0uDxiTo/s1600-h/100_0197.JPG"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oJy9pzsTI/AAAAAAAAAXI/EAsm0uDxiTo/s400/100_0197.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5425159472269209906" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">Photo</span> <span style="font-size:85%;">© Marc Mannheimer</span>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-70937730871776908692010-01-10T18:30:00.003-05:002010-01-10T18:30:00.339-05:00Feature: Marc Mannheimer Day 1Please welcome this week's feature, Marc Mannheimer. Marc is a Cleveland poet that bumps into Christina and I every once in awhile as we mingle in the local poetry scene. He is another very talented poet we think you will enjoy.<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oGye08YgI/AAAAAAAAAXA/6v5PByXXoPg/s1600-h/BIO+Pic.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 299px; height: 224px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0oGye08YgI/AAAAAAAAAXA/6v5PByXXoPg/s400/BIO+Pic.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5425156165459534338" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">BIO</span></span><br /><br />Marc is a mental health worker with his own issues. His poetry is born out of a need to create and express and be acknowledged. (I mean, really, to be acknowledged. What a load of crap.) He can also be quite harsh with himself.<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">open mic nite</span></span><br /><br />music,<br />muses married<br />to grains of sound,<br />shattered shards ,<br />melodies assembling in sequence.<br />the green light, and<br />right red rectangles<br />flashing<br />on/off<br />climbing up the sound system...<br />young lions, lionesses,<br />long tresses, unkempt, curly,<br />darting in and out of faces,<br />on/off<br />red light,<br />bright song,<br />siren call<br />they sing the sirens,<br />but this night<br />for ships<br />to come <i><u>in</u></i><br />to safety.<br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><br />© Marc Mannheimer</span>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-31967544798356820892010-01-10T10:50:00.002-05:002010-01-10T11:01:46.455-05:00Doug Tanoury's Feature Links<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0n3b_fR2lI/AAAAAAAAAWw/ZsolDMuTHw8/s1600-h/16c8b4e.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 111px; height: 111px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0n3b_fR2lI/AAAAAAAAAWw/ZsolDMuTHw8/s400/16c8b4e.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5425139286415628882" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Doug's Feature Links</span><br /><br />Day 1<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-doug-tanoury-day-1.html">Intro / BIO / Poem: "A Trick of Sophocles"</a><br /><br />Day 2<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-doug-tanoury-day-2.html">Poem: "Perfect Morning" / Q&A </a><br /><br />Day 3<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-doug-tanoury-day-3.html">Poem: "Bell Tolls" / Q&A</a><br /><br />Day 4<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-doug-tanoury-day-4.html">Poem: "Breakfast at Banamex" / Q&A</a><br /><br />Day 5<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-doug-tanoury-day-5.html">Poem: "Patron Saint" / Q&A</a><br /><br />Day 6<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2010/01/feature-doug-tanoury-day-6.html">Poem: "Study in Black & White" / Q&A</a><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br />Find Doug elsewhere on the net:<br /><br /><a href="http://home.comcast.net/%7Edtanoury1/Tanoury.html">The Poetry of Doug Tanoury</a><br /><a href="http://funkydog.hopto.org/">Funky Dog Publishing</a>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-55738676637901115912010-01-08T18:25:00.002-05:002010-01-08T18:28:12.720-05:00Feature: Doug Tanoury Day 6<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Study In Black & White</span><br /><br />The Plaza de Torros<br />Is painted in light and shadow.<br />The sol seats ablaze<br />In a hyper-illuminated haze<br />That paints over color<br />With the washed out white<br />Of overexposure.<br /><br />The air over the<br />Sombra seats is grainy,<br />Sprinkled with a graphite<br />And charcoal dust<br />That floats lazily and lingers<br />And never quite settles<br />On a long Mexican afternoon.<br /><br />© Doug Tanoury<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Q&A</span></span><br /><br />Q: How has poetry changed your life?<br /><br />A: Yes, it has changed my life. I have been writing poetry all of my adult life and it has been the one constant. When I have not been anything else, I was always a poet. Before I had a career of a family I was a poet. When I have been nothing else, I was always this. It is very fundamental. I look back at some of the transitions and phases in my poetry and I am always amazed at how they capture the emotional landscape. My poetry is a detailed record of my emotional life and whenever I look back and read it I am touched as I relive key moments. I am so fortunate to have that. It is quite a gift.<br /><br />Q: What advice would you give beginning poets/writers?<br /><br />A: I would advise beginning poets to seek out the company of other poets. They should find a writer's colony or poetry workshop and begin writing with other poets. I think this is a critical first step that is often overlooked.Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-30176962839521652262010-01-07T17:14:00.001-05:002010-01-07T17:18:06.120-05:00Feature: Doug Tanoury Day 5<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Patron Saint</span><br /><br />I found a wooden Santo in an antique shop,<br />Without hands and it called to mind a passage<br />From the New Testament,<br />Where Jesus encourages that offending eyes<br />Be plucked out and tempting hands<br />Be severed by their owners.<br /><br />This Santo with tempting hands removed<br />And paint peeling from his clothes was<br />Keeping the company of sinners<br />Who owned the shop and other lesser Santos<br />With both hands still attached, so I asked:<br />“¿cuánto es este santo?”<br /><br />The shop owner thought for a moment and<br />Slowly replied: “tres mil quinientos”.<br />I paused, then complained: “pero él no tiene las manos”<br />And I thought how much are a Saint’s hands worth<br />That have done such good work, and I said<br />To the shop keeper: “dos mil, no mas”.<br /><br />So now “San Nolasmanos”<br />Keeps the company of a new<br />Even greater sinner, but for me<br />It remains an object of deep devotion,<br />A Santo with tempting hands removed<br />Is one that I can pray to.<br /><br /><span style="font-size: 85%;">© Doug Tanoury</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br /><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse;font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13;" >Q: What is your writing process? Do you write every day?</span></span><div><span style=";font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:100%;" ><span style="border-collapse: collapse;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse;font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13;" >A: I usually wake up quite early when the house is quiet and begin to write. I have been writing poetry with a computer since the mid-1980's. I have recently had a period of time when I was writing poetry every day. The creative process is wildly cyclical with periods of high and low productivity. I am currently on the upswing from a productivity standpoint and I am really happy about that. I have no idea how long that will last, but I am counting my blessings.</span></span></div><div class="im"> <div><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse;font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13;" ><br /></span><span style="border-collapse: collapse;font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13;" >Q: Do you have rituals or habits when you write?</span></span><div><span style=";font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:100%;" ><span style="border-collapse: collapse;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="border-collapse: collapse;font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13;" >A: I often listen to baroque music when I write. I find that it inspires me and I think it finds is way into a poem by help shaping its tone. My favorites are Bach, Scarlatti, Telemann</span><span style="line-height: normal; border-collapse: collapse;font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13;" > and Buxtehude. I love a good cantata and it helps me create.</span></span></div> <span style="border-collapse: collapse;font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13;" ><br /></span></div></div>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-88374037677205963202010-01-06T18:22:00.002-05:002010-01-06T18:27:55.279-05:00Feature: Doug Tanoury Day 4<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Breakfast at Banamex<br /></span><br />Wearing a tight black dress and<br />Very high heels with sharp pointy toes,<br />The woman standing in line says: “Huevos Rancheros.”<br />The sounds the words make as she says them are sexy.<br /><br />“The oven must be very hot,”<br />Says a woman in a white huipile<br />Standing behind her, “At least 500 degrees.”<br /><br />“Celsius?” A man in a navy blue business suite standing<br />in front of the woman wearing the tight black dress and<br />Very high heels with sharp pointy toes asks,<br />And a woman in a grey dress standing in front of him<br />hisses “Idiot” and slaps him on his belly.<br />There is laughter up and down the line.<br /><br />“You must use corn tortillas” a woman's voice says<br />From the front of the line.<br />She is out of sight<br />Near the bank tellers windows.<br /><br />The line is long now and loops, twists and snakes<br />back upon itself and there is a man in a red guayabera<br />near the end of the line that is standing<br />Across from the woman wearing the tight black dress and<br />Very high heels with sharp pointy toes,<br />And he says, and it is not quite certain,<br />But he seems to be talking to someone<br />Who is not there or perhaps to himself:<br /><br />“Breakfast is the saddest meal to eat alone.<br />It says so much about you, like your lover has left you.<br />You sleep alone at night. You have no one.”<br /><br />The woman wearing the tight black dress and<br />Very high heels with sharp pointy toes looks at the floor and<br />Pretends she does not hear the man wearing the red guayabera.<br />The line falls silent and no one speaks.<br />A teller through a window calls,<br />“Next! Next please!<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">© Doug Tanoury</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br />Q: What is one thing you want to be remembered for most as a writer/poet?<br /><br />A: I just want my work to live beyond me. I want it to have a life of its own. I think that is what every poet wants. I have been writing long enough to have accumulated a large body of work and I have been fortunate enough to have a large percentage of it published, online and in print. I would like that process to continue. If for some reason, I cannot write poetry any more, I just want what I have already done to continue to published and read. That is the only legacy I hope for.<br /><br />Q: When did you first have an interest in poetry?<br /><br />A: I began writing poetry in grade school. I went to a small Catholic School in the inner city of Detroit. I found that reading and writing was a great way to escape. I always found poetry entertaining as a boy. I remember being enchanted by Edgar Allan Poe, John Masefield and Robert W. Service. These poets influenced me a great deal as a boy. I also remember my 7th grade poetry anthology entitled: Reflections on a Gift of Watermelon Pickle. This book was delightful and I still remember many of the poems. This was my first interst in poetry as a boy. I began writing poetry seriously as an adult in my early 20's, so around the late 1970s I began to write and publish poetry. I was mentored and encouraged by a number of other poets and this helped me establish myself in this craft.Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-28822317628485565262010-01-05T18:18:00.003-05:002010-01-05T18:32:38.344-05:00Feature: Doug Tanoury Day 3<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Bell Tolls </span><br /><br />The big bells of San Sebastian ring,<br />The first round are long gongs<br />That resonate in the morning air<br />And only with great reluctance<br />Do they slowly fall into full silence.<br /><br />The small bells of San Sebastian ring,<br />The second round are short peals<br />Of high pitch, that cut the morning quiet<br />With excited and anxious rings<br />And quickly fade and evaporate.<br /><br />The bells of San Sebastian ring,<br />Reminding me of the Mass I am missing,<br />The prayers not said, promises unkept,<br />And all the transgressions and sins<br />For which I have not sought<br />Full forgiveness.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">© Doug Tanoury</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br />Q: What are your goals as a writer/poet?<br /><br />A: I have always held modest goals, first and foremost it was to write poetry. It is what I have always loved to do. Beyond that goal, everything else just isn't as important. A poet's first goal should be to write and in doing so hopefully takes some chances along the way. I think it is really quite simple. Poetry will not make you a commercial success or a household name and there is usually not much money involved in it. That has a positive effect, believe it or not, of keeping this art form pure and uncomplicated. This should be definitive proof that every downside has an upside.<br /><br />Q: How do you know when a poem is complete and needs no more revisions or do your poems continually evolve and change?<br /><br />A: I do very little revising of poems. I have always worked that way. When I have finished it, it is finished and I usually have resisted the urge to revise extensively. I have equally resisted editorial changes. Many editors have held out offers to publish a poem I had submitted, if I would change this or that. I have always told them that changes are not possible. I always felt such offers were fundamentally unfair, and I have always regarded them as an intrusion into my poems.<br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0PL0GEQ4rI/AAAAAAAAAWo/-kPqySTiMrI/s1600-h/donostia-euskadi-atardecer-315949-l.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 254px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0PL0GEQ4rI/AAAAAAAAAWo/-kPqySTiMrI/s400/donostia-euskadi-atardecer-315949-l.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5423402472126341810" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.everystockphoto.com/photo.php?imageId=2264631#tab-license"><span style="font-size:85%;">San Sebastian sunset - Atardecer en Donosti - BahÃa de La Concha</span></a>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-29639251522805681422010-01-04T18:37:00.003-05:002010-01-04T18:42:16.986-05:00Feature: Doug Tanoury Day 2<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />Perfect Morning </span><br /><br />It seemed like a perfect morning on the balcony of an apartment<br />In Achrafieh, against the crazy and irregular skyline<br />That is Beirut, where cable wires and television antennas<br />Slash and stab the placid clouds<br />That drift peacefully across the summer sky,<br />Chaos and disorder rule, and stand as proof<br />That the old Phoenician gods have dementia<br />And have sunk so far down into their geriatric funk<br />That they no longer care about anything.<br /><br />In that perfect morning she stood there with me on the balcony,<br />The two of us leaning on the railing and looking out over<br />A drunken geometry and a cacophony of shape<br />That is the cockeyed landscape of East Beirut.<br />She standing in stark contrast<br />With both earrings and necklace<br />Color coordinated with blouse and skirt,<br />A picture of fashion and personal perfection,<br />The queen of everything in its place.<br /><br />What I remember most of that morning,<br />Was how I blended so totally with the skyline,<br />How it embraced all my flaws and imperfections<br />Both great and small, my mismatched clothes<br />My unkempt hair, my slovenly habits and careless ways.<br />I became a part the cityscape that day,<br />High above the streets, in the choking fumes<br />From traffic below that formed a nimbus around me,<br />That celebrated and sanctified<br />My own inner disorder.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">© Doug Tanoury</span><br /><br />**** **** **** ****<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Q&A</span><br /><br />Q: How do you define poetry in general?<br /><br />A: I wrote in a poem once that "Lust is to love, what poetry is to prose." I'd define poetry as literature that possesses a high level of emotional intensity that combines certain devices and techniques. It has a great deal in common with dreams. In fact metaphor, simile, irony, symbolism comprise a language that both dreamers and poet share. Everyone is a poet in so much as they dream. They create a rich world of color, fantasy, symbols and populate this nocturnal landscape with people, animals and spirits. There is something basic and primordial about dreams, and I think that poetry uses many primitive and instinctive modes of communications. I could talk about this for a long time, but I had better stop here.<br /><br />Q: Tell us something about yourself that not many people know about you. :-)<br /><br />A: I don't have any formal education or training as a poet, so I don't have an English degree, but rather a Business degree. I was not trained by academics, but by working poets. I was trained by other poets in writer colony and workshop fashion. I found this so rewarding and I have been lucky to have worked with some very talented and brilliant poets. I spent 10 years writing with the Macomb Fantasy Factory and another 10 years writing online with a group of international poets in a group I founded called Athens Avenue.Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-51500904395711291482010-01-03T18:07:00.004-05:002010-01-03T18:20:25.756-05:00Feature: Doug Tanoury Day 1<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0EkH33s1PI/AAAAAAAAAWY/IY_TWMfeYNM/s1600-h/16c8b4e.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 105px; height: 105px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/S0EkH33s1PI/AAAAAAAAAWY/IY_TWMfeYNM/s400/16c8b4e.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5422655144006046962" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Please welcome our first feature of 2010, Doug Tanoury!<br /><br /><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">BIO</span></span><br /><br />Doug began writing and publishing poetry on the Internet in 1996. He founded Athens Avenue, a international group of Internet poets that write together and support each other in writer's colony fashion. Doug's work has been featured in the New York Times Online, Yahoo Internet Life, The Detroit News and the Detroit Metro Times. His publications credits include electronic as well as traditional ink and paper publications. Simply tying TANOURY into any Internet search engine returns results that reveal a large amount of Doug's recent electronic publications.<br /><br />Doug is the founder of Funky Dog Publishing that specializes in poetry publication in both electronic and traditional media.. Funky Dog Publishing has published both electronic and paperbound poetry chapbooks. Doug's publication credits include Writer's Digest, Poetry Magazine, A Small Garlic Press, The Denver Quarterly, The Pittsburgh Quarterly, Zuzu's Petals, Pif Magazine, Plum Ruby Review as well as many others. Doug has published 17 electronic volumes of poetry that are featured on this site. He is currently working on two new collections of poetry that will be published next year.<span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /><br />**** **** **** ****</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >A Trick of Sophocles </span><br /><br />She enters a play<br />Transcendent,<br />With robes flowing and<br />Swinging high above the action<br />Suspended by wires<br />And a swivel boom<br />Activated by a fulcrum,<br />A deus ex machina,<br />That stops dramatic progress<br />And the plot plodding toward<br />The dark and inevitable.<br /><br />She descends from above,<br />From a painted backdrop<br />That is the sky high above the stage<br />To touch the hero<br />Who is plodding into<br />Truly tragic depth,<br />And by this godly entrance<br />Of divine intervention,<br />She extends one freckled hand,<br />To a mere mortal.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">© Doug Tanoury</span>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-82849686345237130792009-12-31T16:01:00.005-05:002009-12-31T16:25:02.282-05:00Happy New Year!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/Sz0S8kKeDzI/AAAAAAAAAWQ/pl6iwWaZ6SA/s1600-h/2010_5.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 342px; height: 228px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/Sz0S8kKeDzI/AAAAAAAAAWQ/pl6iwWaZ6SA/s400/2010_5.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5421510358132985650" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span>2010 In Discesa </span><span style="font-size:85%;">Photographer: <a href="http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=809">Francesco Marino</a></span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Happy New Year!</span><br /><br />We would like to thank everyone who featured on *Mnemosyne* this past year for sharing their creative passion with us. It has been a delightful year full of excellent music, poetry, short stories, and artwork! It has been fun getting to know each feature through their interview questions as well. And thanks to all our readers who help make our blog successful by leaving thoughtful and friendly comments throughout each feature.<br /><br />The coming year will bring some new changes our way. Look for reviews (book reviews, site reviews etc...) provided by our co-editor Christina Brooks. There will be a slight format change in the near future as well. We look forward to sharing a new year of artistic vision and creative personalities with you. We wish you comfort, love, happiness, security, and prosperity in 2010 and beyond!<br /><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">2009 Features</span></span><br /><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/09/carlton-smiths-feature-links.html">Carlton Smith</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/12/charles-c-brooks-iiis-feature-links.html">Charles C Brooks III</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/10/cheryl-and-janet-snells-feature-links.html">Cheryl and Janet Snell</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/07/christina-brooks-featured-links.html">Christina M Brooks/Rune Warrior</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/07/dianne-borseniks-feature-links.html">Dianne Borsenik</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/11/donna-gagnons-feature-links.html">Donna Gagnon</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/09/douglas-c-pughs-feature-links.html">Douglas C Pugh</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/11/ernest-williamson-iiis-feature-links.html">Ernest Williamson III</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/08/jim-benzs-feature-links.html">Jim Benz</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/09/john-burroughs-feature-links.html">John Burroughs</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/10/heather-schmidts-feature-links.html">Heather Ann Schmidt</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/08/lisa-viciouss-feature-links.html">Lisa Vicious</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/12/michael-hensons-feature-links.html">Michael Henson</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/08/mike-finleys-feature-links.html">Mike Finley</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/09/nabina-dass-feature-links.html">Nabina Das</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/11/s-thomas-summerss-feature-links.html">S. Thomas Summers</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/07/stephan-ansteys-feature-links.html">Stephan Anstey</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/11/tikuli-dogras-feature-links.html">Tikuli Dogra</a><br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/10/tim-bucks-feature-links.html">Tim Buck</a>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-31455798165095240712009-12-13T20:06:00.003-05:002009-12-13T20:14:08.115-05:00Charles C Brooks III's Feature Links<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/SyWPrHBTykI/AAAAAAAAAWE/HPXvmOEQ240/s1600-h/58900008%5B1%5D.JPG"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 312px; height: 206px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_2_N1oJowiO4/SyWPrHBTykI/AAAAAAAAAWE/HPXvmOEQ240/s400/58900008%5B1%5D.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5414892097764575810" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >Charles's Feature Links</span><br /><br /><br />Day 1<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/12/feature-charles-c-brooks-iii.html">Intro/ BIO/ Poem: "launching" </a><br /><br />Day 2<a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/12/feature-charles-c-brooks-iii-day-2.html"><br />Poem: "Nights at the Plantation" / Q&A</a><br /><br />Day 3<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/12/feature-charles-c-brooks-iii-day-3.html">Poem: "Pilgrimage"/ Q&A</a><br /><br />Day 4<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/12/feature-charles-c-brooks-day-4.html">Poem: "Saturday Night in Athens" / Q&A</a><br /><br />Day 5<br /><span style="font-size:100%;"><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/12/feature-charles-c-brooks-iii-day-5.html">Poem: "<span style="line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">the cotton club and shootin’ for you"</span> / Q&A</a></span><br /><br />Day 6<br /><a href="http://mnemosynepoetica.blogspot.com/2009/12/feature-charles-c-brooks-iii-day-6.html">Poem: "On a Train" / Q&A</a>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-28449078363414119752009-12-12T00:13:00.005-05:002009-12-12T00:20:04.255-05:00Feature: Charles C Brooks III Day 6<span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><br />On a Train</span><br /><br />Train-traveling was a cabaret,<br />and youth made me depend on it.<br />Small-town lights smeared<br />and an infant always fussed.<br />From my seat, one row up,<br />a Nefertiti in blue jeans<br />read Neruda.<br /><br />Near the rear a man, lost,<br />stared out with tired, yellow eyes.<br />Another couple made out,<br />moving hands beneath a checkered blanket.<br />I passed them,<br />swaying like a drunkard<br />to the smoking car.<br /><br />The ride rushed me towards a girl.<br />Three days later we wept<br />on the same platform<br />with desperate good bye’s.<br />It was an innocent Casablanca.<br /><br />Ticket turned in,<br />a suitcase was taken<br />up the stairs.<br />Like a cylindrical parent,<br />that Appalachian Express<br />rocked me back to Georgia.<br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-size:85%;">© Charles C Brooks III</span></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:85%;">**** **** **** ****</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; font-weight: bold;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size:85%;">Q&A</span></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >Who has had an impact on your writing style\career?</span></b></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" ><br /></span></b> </p><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >I was mentored by Larry Fagin for about six months.<span> </span>He worked closely with Allen Ginsberg and taught me how to write poetry free from old modes of thinking.<span> </span>Larry Fagin helped me hone my words in order to maximize impact.<span> </span>He never liked my sprawling poetry, but no relationship is perfect.<span> </span></span>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-308476111836253756.post-6694787294485085032009-12-10T19:03:00.004-05:002009-12-10T19:08:56.501-05:00Feature: Charles C Brooks III Day 5<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >the cotton club and shootin’ for you</span></b></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" ><br /></span></b></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" > </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >his need to pull out of a splendid hole put him in a barely better home,</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >a city that allowed quasi-happiness, money, his shows</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >that moved from london to chicago while technique and velocity became nuance</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" ><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" > </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >armstrong smoked weed before shows, after shows, with coffee</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >catapulted by the mob to open doors, to revenues and fame </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >so movies would reel out </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >with his trombone tone everyone knew and showered in</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" ><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" > </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >his blessed madam calming came out of a club </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >and into a waiting taxi</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >‘pops’ bumbling over himself and bass players to make room for love,</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >his heart completely hers, joyous confetti, she, that louisiana princess,</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >the last wife was a detail,</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" ><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" > </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >the halls, in new york, in germany singing to hear eisenhower wasn’t</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >ready to kill jim crow as europe never blinked, africa suffered, </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >everyone saw blood,</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >a million eyes looking forward, his bare-chested affection for the south, </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >a pale nemesis</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: right;" class="MsoNormal" align="right"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" ><br /></span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" > </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >he shoveled so much of himself out, gone, given, free-for-the-most-part,</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >an anti-tommy hiding as a rebel </span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >with this broad, intelligent smile, beauty bowing before royalty,</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >making governments call out <i>communist</i> while his music won the war</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><br /><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" ></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:85%;">© Charles C Brooks III</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><br /><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" ></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >**** **** **** ****</span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; font-weight: bold;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" ></span></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; font-weight: bold;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >Q&A</span></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><br /><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" ></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt" >Q: Where do you write? Is Ambiance Important?<br /></span></b></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;color:black;" ><br /></span></b> </p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:'Times New Roman','serif';font-size:12pt;" >Poetry comes to me anywhere.<span> </span>I carry small notebooks and if some nuance grabs me I’ll write it down immediately.<span> </span>Yet, I do all the refining in my study.<span> </span>Especially with my more involved, lengthy pieces I have to be in a place that’s designed around me.<span> </span>I envy those who can compose in their cars or while working a day job.<span> </span>There’s never a time I write without music.<span> </span>Even outside I am plugged in.<span> </span>Music made me want to be a poet.<br /></span></p>Kerowyn Rosehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05427992468681976349noreply@blogger.com0