CIRCADIA - kevin mcpherson eckhoff (Gaspereau Press Limited)

Today's book of poetry:

CIRCADIA.  kevin mcpherson eckhoff.  Devil's Whim Occasional Chapbook Series.  Devil's Whim Chapbook No. 37.  Gaspereau Press Limited.  Kentville, Nova Scotia.  2018.

kevin mcpherson eckhoff's CIRCADIA gives us twelve absolutely engaging list poems.  Those of you poetry babies who regularly attend Today's book of poetry will remember our fondness of the form.  eckhoff's poems, each of the twelve is titled for a month of the year, are scatalogical gold.

Before you are finished the all too brief CIRCADIA, you really will not want it to end, eckhoff will have you travel from lemming history and Play-Doh to the Violent Femmes and the male CEO of Mother's Against Drunk Driving. This is deep-sea diving without taking a breath.

If this were a road trip, it would be one of the best; CIRCADIA is poetry rendered into hilarious and somewhat doomed hopscotch.  Not sure if eckhoff would ever take his foot off of the gas, but what a ride.

September

    Play that song,

     Play it again.

     Now, improvise.

          JOHN LENT, "INTERSECTIONS"

I ate some cotton candy. I bought a plastic Wonder

Woman cup for a dollar. I lifted some weights. I'm

not in a classroom teaching. I didn't vomit. I picked

up four boxes of books and papers and puppets and

knickknacks that the custodian had cleaned out of 

my office at Okanagan College. I ate five peaches. I

asked the president of the board of directors to step

down. I spit my gum out the car window. I brought

home an orphaned baby vole. Kiddo named the baby

vole, which we've since learned may actually be a

pack rat, Diggin' Smily. I ran. We moved the toddler-

sized armchair into the bathroom because my

3-year-old was spending so much of his day on the

potty and the milking stool gets so hard on the butt

after reading five books. I lifted some weights. My

3-year-old asked: "What does God think of John

Lent?" I flipped a table to emphasize a point. I drove

to Vancouver. Playing at the park with my 1-year-old,

the moonrise was a word thief. I ran. There were

many toads on the road. I ate some popcorn. A kid at

the park told me that he is really into parkour and

that he just learnt about it yesterday. I watched a

lawyer cage his tears, in part, because I questioned

his actions and abilities. I petted a capybara. I didn't

go to the lantern festival. I deactivated my Facebook

account. I cried. I texted so much while driving. I

wondered how dreams work. I took three boxes of

books to the bookstore to sell. I spotted a fawn on

the side of the highway nuzzling a large lump of

brown fur.

📣📣📣📣

The twelve monthly missives make for a eventful year, eckhoff is hammering out poems that are consistent, anti-cryptic, clear cut, and clean of artifice.  What more could the poetry angels ask for?

Today's book of poetry loves the way kevin mcpherson eckhoff rolls the dice and we cannot wait to see more of this obviously smarty-pants brilliant poet's poetry.  

CIRCADIA makes it all simple, a grandfather dies as easily as a snack of warm nuts appears.  A crossword puzzle and Max Ernst's The Hundred Headless Woman appear on the same palette and with the same simple but vivid colours.

March

     Between thought and expression, let us now kiss the culprit.

     Ooh, I don't know just what it's all about

          VELVET UNDERGROUND, "SOME KINDA LOVE"

I almost had sex. I ran. I didn't wear a seatbelt. I got

shit-eared by Laurel because her favorite foliage in

the front yard, a red twig dogwood, which she kept

calling forsythia, was by her judgement, irreparably

over-pruned by my mother. I played at the park. I 

auditioned for the role of James. I Googled "how to

cook frozen steaks." I drank three coffees. I lifted

some weights. I watched my 3-year-old reveal how a

cattail that has survived the winter contains the fluff

of roughly a hundred thousand billion dandelion

seeds. I had a new passport photo taken. I went to

the chiropractor. I went swimming in the public

pool. I cleaned up my 3-year-old's puke from the bed.

I lifted some weights. I bought the hedgehog a 

wheel, in which it ran for 90 minutes. I threw up. I

did not lift any weights. I wondered about the word

"hide" --how its noun and verb meanings collide. I

threw rocks into a creek. I lifted some weights. I had

sex. I momentarily fell asleep on the hardwood floor

while my 3-year-old and I hid from Jehovah's

Witnesses who were knocking on our door. I started

watching the second season of Daredevil. I shaved. I

ran. I beat up the cherry tree using a scythe to sap

my anger. I ate a lot of chocolate. My 3-year-old

tossed a shred of toenail into the hash browns

as they were frying. I picked up my new passport.

I didn't buy my mom a birthday gift.

📣📣📣📣📣

It's almost spring here in Ottawa and we are all anxiously awaiting "open-window-weather", in the meantime we will rely on poetry like kevin mcpherson eckhoff's refreshing CIRCADIA.  There is so much to enjoy in these inventories, catalogues, lists, poems.

Today's book of poetry has Pharoah Sanders blasting out of the box, his seminal recording of "Oh Lord, let me do no wrong."  Today's book of poetry bought this recording many years ago, in Los Angeles, and then played it non-stop as we drove our rented car up and down California.  Sanders always gives Today's book of poetry more than we asked for, always a life-confirming Walt Whitman "barbaric yawp."  CIRCADIA dances like that, a rhythm all of its own.

June

          I waited in the shadow of my stupid house.

               JAMES FRANCO, "THERE IS A LIGHT THAT NEVER GOES OUT"

I rolled down a grassy hill. I went to my first gala film

premiere. I lifted some weights. I only had one

coffee. I sneezed. I killed a mosquito. I cleaned the

vegetable crisper. I saw my best friend. I self-taped

an audition for the role of Shawn in a film called He's

Out There, even though I know I won't get it. I was

hot. I ate some buffalo-wing-flavoured combos. I

swam in Okanagan Lake. I ran. I didn't get a

callback. I thought about Orlando, the city, not the

book. I clipped my fingernails. I saw a fly trapped in

a Ziploc bag at the playground and I didn't let it out.

My parents visited. I read 36 chapbook-length

manuscripts. I tried teaching my 10-month-old how

to gesture "momma" in American Sign Language,

which he could only imitate as "bitch." I lifted some

weights. I lamented not having found Anne Tardos

and her work 10 years ago. I felt like a hammer. I

nabbed a feral kitten out from under a red minivan at

Caravan Farm Theatre and brought it home. I went

swimming at the green boathouse. The kitten went

to live with our friend Cody. I signed up for a 

LinkedIn account. I ran. I read about Yuxweluptun's

proposal to rename B.C. I worked out at the Vernon

Boxing Club for the first time.

📣📣📣📣📣📣

Today's book of poetry looks out over our big wooden desk and sees the room Michael Hewko built for me.  A quick and simple look at our shelves quickly reveals how poetry beasts like David Clewell, Stuart Ross, Cameron Anstee, David Collins, et al., have showered on our office with generosity.  The poetry world can be like that.  We have much to be thankful for in these offices and it gives Today's book of poetry hope.

In CIRCADIA eckhoff circumnavigates some difficult terrain but with such elan that the lasting impression is one of giddy comfort.  You will have a poetry smile on your face after reading this book, our new intern Tomas guarantees it.

kevin mcpherson eckhoff

ABOUT THE POET

Kevin McPherson Eckhoff is a writer, an actor, a teacher, a hubbub and a daddoo. The Globe & Mail described his most recent book—their biography (BookThug)—as “wide-ranging” and “incredibly playful.” He plays one of the lead characters in Sean Braune’s feature film Nuptials. By day, he teaches writing and shit at Okanagan College with his very star bff, Jake Kennedy; by night, he lives on unceded Splats’in Territory with a Laurel and two miniscule muscular men.

gaspereau.com

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DISCLAIMERS

Poems cited here are assumed to be under copyright by the poet and/or publisher.  They are shown here for publicity and review purposes.  For any other kind of re-use of these poems, please contact the listed publishers for permission.

We here at TBOP are technically deficient and rely on our bashful Milo to fix everything.  We received notice from Google that we were using "cookies"

and that for our readers in Europe there had to be notification of the use of those "cookies.  Please be aware that TBOP may employ the use of some "cookies" (whatever they are) and you should take that into consideration.

Amateurs At Love — Patricia Young (Icehouse Poetry/Goose Lane Editions)

Today's book of poetry:
Amateurs At Love.  Patricia Young.  Icehouse Poetry/Goose Lane Editions.  Fredericton, New Brunswick.  2018.

Today's book of poetry has Pharoah Sanders on the box and he's cracking out a sterling version of his song "Africa/You've Got To Have Freedom" and we are loving it.  That's about as good as it gets.  Today's book of poetry wanted something lively, joyous, up beat to help us celebrate Patricia Young's Amateurs At Love. 

Patricia Young is no amateur.  Today's book of poetry has been down the Patricia Young road twice before.  Once for Short Takes on the Apocalypse (Biblioasis,2016), and once for her Consider The Paragliders (Baseline Press, 2018).  You can see them both here:

http://michaeldennispoet.blogspot.com/2017/04/short-takes-on-apocalypse-patricia.html

http://michaeldennispoet.blogspot.com/2018/03/consider-paragliders-patricia-young.html

And here we go again.  It should be clear why, once again Patricia Young has hit us in the poetry sweet spot.

Amateurs At Love is crafted into six sections, each alive with its own magic.  Today's book of poetry got stuck in the first section, "This Could Be Anyone's Story", stuck isn't the right word, neither is paralyzed.  We're going to go with transfixed.  These short prose poems are note perfect, precise and patient.

Young is a pro.

Inside Sleep Country, Bird Murals

INSIDE SLEEP COUNTRY, BIRD MURALS glow on the walls:

peacocks and flamingoes, macaws and parrots. The old man wants

a firm mattress. The old woman longs for a good night's rest.

But the warehouse is a gruelling maze of daybed, canopy beds,

waterbeds, platform beds, sofa beds, truckle beds. Beds the size of

coffins and sandboxes. Beds sluggish as tugboats and shallow as

wading pools. They lean against a child's bunk and remove their

shoes. After you, he says, and she begins her ascent. They climb the

ladder, heads butting through clouds and sunsets, until they roll,

exhausted, onto a super-deluxe, memory foam mattress. Lying on

their backs, they talk about old wounds, betrayals, and whiplash

lust and bursitis. They have children, don't they? Grandchildren,

too? The lights dim. They hear the last customer leave. Doors lock.

Plumage rustles. There's a lone creeing sound. They reach shyly

across the expanse. After all these years, how is it possible? They're

still amateurs at love.

💫💫💫

Today's book of poetry sent Thomas, our newest intern, into the stacks to see what else we had in stock from Patricia Young.  Young has published 12 books of poetry and six chapbooks (as well as a novel).  We have eight of her poetry titles on our shelves, in no particular order:

Those Were The Mermaid Days

Melancholy Ain't No Baby

More Watery Still

Here Come The Moonbathers

Night-Eater

What I Remember From My Time On Earth

Short Takes on the Apocalypse

Consider The Paragliders

And now young Thomas, our newest intern, will be tasked with finding Patricia Young's other titles. 

Today's book of poetry would be remiss not to suggest you dear readers do the same; look for Patricia Young books.  We suspect, that like us, you will discover a voice worth your good time and a wit you wish you had.

Amateurs At Love is gold.  Like the afore-mentioned Pharoah Sanders, Patricia Young knows how to come correct.  In "Animal Tales", another of the six sections, Young and anthropomorphism get into a Noah's Ark of four legged and winged creatures.  Young treats them with respect, reveals their wit.  You'll believe every word because Young has the true burn.  It all sounds like the truth.

Rabbit

When the children peered through gaps in the fence surrounding

their play area they were confronted with a shocking sight — a

teenage girl whipping a rabbit with a willow branch. The girl

heard the children's whimpering and came over and threatened

to whip them too. So young and so pitiless, the daycare workers

said as they shuffled the little ones into the church basement where

they sloughed off their Muddy Buddies and rolled out their mats. It

was time to nap. Time to dream. That night the children told their

parents about the girl and rabbit, and the next day their parents

told their friends, who then told their friends, and so on, person

to person, until rumours of the girl's pathology travelled around

the globe, full circle, returning to the rabbit who merely rolled his

pink eyes. The children were fantasists, of course. To the rabbit's

mind, truth was the water dish in the corner of his hutch, the whiff

of clover on a summer morning, the diamond stud in the girl's ski

jump nose.

💫💫💫

Goose

The goose was in love with three ganders and they loved her in

return. The farmer, however, had no time for romance. Financially,

he was in over his head and also underwater. He needed to

downsize. This worried the animals, especially the goose. A month

earlier, on her birthday, she'd laid her last egg. Now, no matter

how she bore down — not one speckled oval. Like all lovesick

creatures, the ganders were a font of ideas and suggested the goose

feign broodiness. An excellent plan, she said, and refused to leave

her nest, even to eat or drink. Day and night her adoring ganders

gathered around to recite sonnets in praise of her fertility but after

the third debt collector had driven off, the farmer summoned his

hapless  waterfowl. You've laid more eggs than any other goose, he

said, and I am grateful, but you are old, old girl, and now you must

return to the bee balm and sky. Too dignified to make a fuss, the

goose arranged her head on the chopping block and the axe came

down. Instead of blood, a bouquet of dandelions spouted from her

neck. The awestruck ganders watched as the yellow clusters turned

swiftly to seed balls. Puff, they cackled, puff, puff.

💫💫💫

It's a rainy gray day in the nation's capital but we're all smiles here at Today's book of poetry.  When the pros drop in they make our life easy.  The morning read was both humorous and profound.  Young can be Richard Pryor funny and deadly serious at the same time.  Great trick.

Thomas, our newest intern, was introduced to the morning read this morning and of course because he is new he had to read first.  Thomas looked us right in the eyes and then nailed it, read Patricia Young with wit and timing.  We gave him and Amateurs At Love the full standing ovation.  Thomas bowed.

Mother

I took her hand and pulled her toward the park and begged her to

explain why everything I wanted to know was unknowable, like the

boys hanging around the edge of the canal. I wanted to know the 

difference between hypocrisy and lust. Also: the true story of Adam

and Eve. Was the Garden of Eden a foreign country where you

drank from a porcelain fountain or was it the beast with two backs?

I wanted to know: how could a beast have two backs? Other things

too: tricks to stay sane in prison. Should I memorize passages from

the Bible or Dante? Hanging upside down on the monkey bars,

I wanted to know why she, my mother, sitting on a stone bench

unwrapping a small meat pie, had blotted out her past. She bit into

the cold pastry, gravy oozing from the corners of her mouth, and I

wanted to know, would I too have to reinvent myself with duct tape

and flowers?

💫💫💫

Today's book of poetry is clearly a Patricia Young fan, you will be too if you can get your hands on Amateurs At Love.  Just like Pharoah Sanders, you can't go wrong.

Patricia Young

ABOUT THE POET

Patricia Young has published twelve collections of poetry and one of short fiction. Her poems have been widely anthologized and she has received numerous awards for her writing, including the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize, the B.C. Book Prize, the Pat Lowther Memorial Award, a CBC Literary Prize, several National Magazine Awards, the Bliss Carman Award, and the Confederation Poets Prize. She has twice been nominated for the Governor General's Award for Poetry. She lives in Victoria.

BLURBS

"Amateurs at Love is as delectable as anything I've read in ages. Young delivers her salty truths in dreamscapes that straddle a ridge between drollery and devastating one-two punches. Here you will find prickly pangramics, grousing animalia, family fables, insight and allegory, and — as in the best of teh best — yourself." 

     — Sharon McCartney

"These poems could well be anyone's story, but each told in light touches is particular, the tone sometimes dark, if kept steadfastly whimsical in intent. A horse gorges on fermented daisies. Mice haunt a cottage with their absence. A boy comes to understand his mother has no answers for him. Not Patricia Young. Thankfully, in Amateurs at Love, she has found one for almost everything."

      — John Barton

"In Amateurs at Love, Patricia Young reveals parallel realities, not ghosts but fleeting glimpses of ourselves. Everyday love coexists as drama on a momentary stage, just on the other side of a veil, or it lives in a dreamlike state in which we are not sure if we are being dreamed or are dreamers. Young's extraordinary power of observation draws us in with fine detail, and the resonant precision of her language carries us along." 

     — Patrick Friesen

Patricia Young Reads from An Auto-Erotic History of Swings

Video: Sono Nis Press

gooselane.com 

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Poems cited here are assumed to be under copyright by the poet and/or publisher.  They are shown here for publicity and review purposes.  For any other kind of re-use of these poems, please contact the listed publishers for permission.

We here at TBOP are technically deficient and rely on our bashful Milo to fix everything.  We received notice from Google that we were using "cookies"

and that for our readers in Europe there had to be notification of the use of those "cookies.  Please be aware that TBOP may employ the use of some "cookies" (whatever they are) and you should take that into consideration.

Celebration Machine - Dale Tracy (Proper Tales Press)

Today's book of poetry:
Celebration Machine.  Dale Tracy.  Proper Tales Press.  Cobourg, Ontario.  2018.

"If a violin sounds sad, is it?"

from: Serious Living

Today's book of poetry had never encountered the poetry of Dale Tracy before but it sure made my morning.  Celebration Machine came as a real positive punch in the head when needed.  Today's book of poetry gets herds of poetry in the mail and we read it all, some of it irritates as it goes down.  Dale Tracy was definitely a tonic.

Celebration Machine has a feel of intelligent whimsy.  Today's book of poetry was never certain where Tracy was taking us, but we always enjoyed the ride.  Some of these poems have the feel of lost fairy tales or new myths.  Put it this way; Dale Tracy reminded Today's book of poetry how much we love poetry, how much we love seeing how another mind works.  Dale Tracy's works wonders.

It's raining. /Me too.

Every galaxy has a hole at its centre.

The sun will never turn into a black hole.

The earth will never fall into a black hole.

That's the kind of thing we know.

Someone was thrifty with the skin

when they sewed me. Many surfaces

complete the body. Something lines

your lungs. Under every skin is another one.

If people were poems I'd be a detective.

If I were a courier I'd be a poet. It's perplexing

because I am a poet but don't have your parcel,

or anything else you asked for.

💫💫💫

"or anything else you asked for."  Perfect.

Rainy day here in the National Capitol Region and a few of our minions didn't make the trek into the office this morning.  They will be dealt with in the appropriate way.  None the less our morning reading was spot on.  Pharoah Sanders and Jack Hicks were kicking it up in back and Dale Tracy sounded like they were born burning.

Tracy has mastered the knack of some of the old masters, don't hit the reader over the head, lull them in to a sense of security, like lobsters in a cold water pot, but cook 'em just the same.  Gentle tenacity.  Celebration Machine is never going to bash your brain with new sensibilities - Tracy wins the audience with her sneaky precision attached to a wildly flamboyant sense of the absurd.

This isn't the tallest or fasted ride at the amusement park but it has the longest line forming behind it.  Why?  Because Dale Tracy makes it all work precise.  Intelligent design.

Fantasy of Being a Quirk in the System

Not the woman by my peonies lingering

with a lighter off the sidewalk, like nothing to burn

Not the man spreading piled leaves thin

across the road, foot's outside edge scraping, like butter knife

Not the kid on training wheels and a bicycle

circling feet in the air off the pedals, like hung spider

A quirk in the system feels like the system

If noticed, it seems innocent, like an accident

💫💫💫

Today's book of poetry remains committed to posting a new blog/review every couple of days but real life keeps raising it's ugly head and getting in the way.  No new excuses though, we will try to do better in the coming months.

Dale Tracy's Celebration Machine reminds Today's book of poetry exactly why we are doing these blogs/reviews in the first place.  That feeling you get when you read something entirely new, amazing, entertaining.  That feeling you get when you've discovered another writer to admire.

Stomach End of the Tongue

I ate my own shadow.

I feel it pulling on the stomach end of my tongue.

The spaces where my fingers would web if they did

show my body's sloshing bruise.

I grip my hand around my limbs to trap it.

I drink pure sunlight.

Finally, I catch a corner emerging from my mouth

and pull it to the ground.

I stand on it.

💫💫💫

One of the weird pleasure Today's book of poetry gets from posting these blogs/reviews is that we actually type out each and every poem, no copying.  The reason is that Today's book of poetry believes it helps us get inside the poems.  True or not it is a kick when you're typing along and then you get to the end of a poem like Tracy's "Stomach End of the Tongue" and the poet nails it right to the floor.  It's a giddy little ride.

Celebration Machine continues the fine Proper Tales Press tradition of finding undiscovered gems.  Dale Tracy burns.

👌

On a personal note, today is the 26th anniversary of my marriage to Kirsteen Ann Jackson.  Best thing I ever did.  28 best years of my life.  And Kirsty is the reason Today's book of poetry has been up and running since 2013.  Kirsty makes me feel loved every day and I guess that's the best any one person can do for another.  Fingers crossed for another 28 years together.  Thank you Kirsty.

👌

Dale Tracy

ABOUT THE POET

Dale Tracy is the author of the chapbook Celebration Machine (Proper Tales, 2018) and the monograph With the Witnesses: Poetry, Compassion, and Claimed Experience (McGill-Queen’s, 2017). Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in The Goose, Arch, The Week Shall Inherit the Verse, Gatherings (a chapbook series edited by Stephen Johnson and Jenn Cole), an Artfest Ontario anthology, Puddles of Sky’s illiterature series, and What it Satisfies, a four-poem chappoem from Puddles of Sky. Dale Tracy is Assistant Professor (on contract) in the Department of English at the Royal Military College of Canada.

propertalespress@gmail.com

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DISCLAIMERS

Poems cited here are assumed to be under copyright by the poet and/or publisher.  They are shown here for publicity and review purposes.  For any other kind of re-use of these poems, please contact the listed publishers for permission.

We here at TBOP are technically deficient and rely on our bashful Milo to fix everything.  We received notice from Google that we were using "cookies"

and that for our readers in Europe there had to be notification of the use of those "cookies.  Please be aware that TBOP may employ the use of some "cookies" (whatever they are) and you should take that into consideration.

Sinners Dance — Darrell Epp (Mosaic Press)

Today's book of poetry:
Sinners Dance.  Darrell Epp.  Mosaic Press.  Oakville, Ontario.  2017.

Today's book of poetry is willing to go down any road Darrell Epp chooses to take us.  Sinners Dance continues the hard driving standard we've come to expect from Mr. Epp.

Sinners Dance is the third title by Darrell Epp that Today's book of poetry has explored.  You can find links to Today's book of poetry and After Hours (Mosaic Press, 2016) and Imaginary Maps (Signature Editions) right here:

http://michaeldennispoet.blogspot.com/2017/06/after-hours-darrell-epp-mosaic-press.html

http://michaeldennispoet.blogspot.com/2017/11/imaginary-maps-darrell-epp-signature.html 

The only thing that has changed with Darrell Epp's new poetry, Sinners Dance, is that the beautiful bastard is getting better.  He's upped his game.  Sinners Dance brims with lovely movies and astonishing novels, all sorts of entertainments, disguised as tight, brief and illuminating poems.

Left Lung

the fuzzy black spot on the x-ray reminded

him of a dark star which reminded him of a

movie but this was no movie, the specialist

was very sorry, left lung he said but meant

right lung, the image was reversed, how odd

to be alive, standing in the hub of the world's

sweaty churning in a miami dolphins jersey

not knowing what to say, where to aim. he

thought of that end-times prophet preaching

in front of jackson square; the beast rising

from the sea, the woman with MYSTERY

tattooed on her forehead. he wished he'd

listened, he wished he'd hugged him, why

hadn't he hugged him, he thought of being

a kid, racing his bike up the ramp, catching

air, defying gravity, moments so pregnant

they were building blocks for every other

moment, like fighting against rush hour

traffic, the endless throbbing of it all, he

headed down main west toward james st.,

he'd find that guy waving his homemade

signs, he'd touch him, and as the stock

exchange wound down, as tanks moved

across the desert, confess everything.

💫💫💫

Darrell Epp's poetry often leads to fits of jealousy for Today' book of poetry, when what I really want is to share how fine I find these poems.  One of Epp's excellent tricks is to allow the reader instant access.  Epp doesn't put anything between the story he wants to tell and the reader.  The reader digests these poems on contact.

Another thing about Sinners Dance, Epp is getting wiser.  So many of these poems wrap up the frayed edges of our thinking.  Today's book of poetry isn't suggesting that Darrell Epp suddenly has the answer to everything, instead his poetry leads us, without impediment, to the right questions.

Winter Dream

'talking about shopping is not really talking,'

she said, that's why she didn't answer

jill's texts anymore, that's why she blocked

her on facebook. i said, 'there's an

alternative world where i'm an mvp,

a vip, with dozens of grandkids.'

she said, 'that's cool,' and carved

obscenities with her thumb into

the frost caked on the window.

that winter the world was our

idea, our boozy chauffeur, our

hunchbacked prankmonkey

somersaulting on command.

the spell lasted until the cat

got sick, the vet's disdainful

looks made us feel like guilty

truants, she gave him the finger

as i paid the pharmacist, then

the pipes froze on us and nine

months later she was teaching

english on the island of kyoto.

💫💫💫

Today's book of poetry has Pharoah Saunders on the box this morning and that should come as no surprise.  Our morning read was led, with brisk enthusiasm, by Milo, our head tech.  Milo suggested we come up with a name, a title, a designation of some respect, per se, for the poets we've visited at least three times.

Off the top of my snowy-white head memory would suggest that list include Nelson Ball, Sue Goyette, Stuart Ross and now Darrell Epp.  We will have to look a little closer to confirm our list.

Today's book of poetry is open to suggestion.  We threw Milo's idea around the room and liked it, then we agreed we'd wait until we heard what you readers thought.  We can't wait to hear what you think.

Once we started reading Darrell Epp's Sinners Dance, everyone on our staff entered Epp world and did our best to hammer these fine poems home.

Halo of Flies

i'm patrolling my turf, counting the windows without

glass, the bakeries and shoe stores turned into squats.

this is where ifrah hitched a ride on the handlebars of

my mountain bike, this is where lily informed me we

had nothing in common, she made it sound like she

was imparting the secret of the universe and i could

barely stifle a yawn. that's the first escape where we

looked for mars the war god through your brother's

telescope, had chin-up contests off the ladder. i give

it a tug and the metal groans and shakes, oxidation

takes no prisoners. rust always wins but he doesn't

have to be so smug about it. i'll come back with a

camera, i'll record all the fading signage before

the demolition crews make way for gentrification.

i'm in the dog house because i forgot valentine's

day, my wife says i seem distracted, my head's

an empty bag, my heart's a corroded cog, my

left brain trips up my right brain like a saboteur,

i see consciousness as a halo of flies, as the

900-pound gorilla on the other end of the

seesaw. i step on a crack, say a prayer, give

thanks for the men who poured the concrete,

laid the bricks and pipes we take for granted,

recall there's grace enough for everybody.

💫💫💫

"recall there's grace enough for everybody."  That is a great line and a fine end.

Today's book of poetry has always liked lists.  Darrell Epp is going on our list, the list we keep close for ready referral.  Sinners Dance will reel you around the floor, make you guilty-dizzy in parts, happy-dizzy in others.

That's some good dancing.

Darrell Epp

ABOUT THE POET

Darrell Epp’s poetry has appeared in dozens of magazines including Maisonneuve, Poetry Ireland, Sub-Terrain, and The Saranac Review. His previous poetry collection include Imaginary Maps (Signature Editions, 2009) and After Hours (Mosaic Press, 2016). Darrell lives in Hamilton, Ontario.

BLURBS

“Sinners Dance places the reader in a pre-apocalyptic world, clearly recognizable as our own …There is wit in Epp’s writing, but the overall view of life is bleak, the guardians of our civilization blind, the maps deceiving.”
     – Bernadette Rule, Hamilton Review of Books


“Epp’s poems have a distinct Hamilton flavour, he also says there are certain truths and experiences everyone can identify with, no matter where they live.”
     – Emma Reilly, Interview & Feature in the Hamilton Spectator

Darrell Epp

reads

Pregnant Fly Dead on my Windshield

Video:  Darrell Epp

mosaic-press.com

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DISCLAIMERS

Poems cited here are assumed to be under copyright by the poet and/or publisher.  They are shown here for publicity and review purposes.  For any other kind of re-use of these poems, please contact the listed publishers for permission.

We here at TBOP are technically deficient and rely on our bashful Milo to fix everything.  We received notice from Google that we were using "cookies"

and that for our readers in Europe there had to be notification of the use of those "cookies.  Please be aware that TBOP may employ the use of some"cookies" (whatever they are) and you should take that into consideration

Acceptable Time — Tom Moore (Ravenna Press)

Today's book of poetry:
Acceptable Time.  Tom Moore.  Ravenna Press.  Spokane, Washington.  2016.

Rock

The boulders are whispering in the sea heat.

It's the same sun they've known

for a million years, the same sea.

As we walk along the beach we might

think they're just

dumb stones

but they are merely slow.

It takes so long for their mouths

to open (and a single vowel ten-thousand

years to form) that we don't hear.

We don't sense the changes overcoming

these rocks

as they split themselves into speech

nor the language of minds so strange

we're blurs on a copper sun.

...

That's how you write a poem!  Is it just me? I had to read "Rock" two or three times before I absorbed it all, before it sunk in.  Sometimes I think my head is made out of rock.

When Tom Moore is on, and he is on like a freaking siren, he is electric.  And funny.  Dark funny — and all you regular readers of Today's book of poetry know that we like that best.

As one of our Today's book of poetry heroes, the great Charles Bukowski said, when asked about writing poems:  "they must be full of power, they must make you want to turn the page."  And Tom Moore is all over that.

Don't be distracted by the lazy Bukowski quote.  Today's book of poetry loves Buk, but to be clear, Tom Moore's poetry is nothing like Charles the B.  We used the quote because Moore not only has power, he knows how to use it, and yes, we want to turn the page.

Hunting Out of Season

Though it's not his habit to be contrite

he enter the forest cautiously

for this is the place where the light over-spills

frozen ponds

and flocks in the long grass gather.

After checking his compass to make

quite sure

he's lost

he starts

to sing mating songs—waits

for the deer girls to show.

Slowly, they spill

from the forest with

legs of careful stepping

and their heads held high—

so near

the whole herd

clatters through his brain.

The eyes of each are blessed

with the gift of

perfect trajectory

and his songs bore into their minds

like bullets

they can't hear.

...

Today's book of poetry had to get Max, our Sr. Editor, out of his private salon/saloon, and team him up with Milo, our head tech, to try and find out who this Tom Moore is.  No luck at all.  Nothing!  The only thing Today's book of poetry knows about Tom Moore is that he can burn.

If he were a boxer he'd be a champ and most of his opponents would later complain that they didn't see it coming.  Moore has the velvet glove with a big old anvil inside.

What Today's book of poetry most admired in Moore's Acceptable Time was the Moore never rushes anything.  Moore likes to play it sweet until just before the curtain, and it works.  These poems act like crisp fables, the lessons uncertain until the last line, last word.  That's how to make it sing.

Bulb

At first it stayed in the shoebox

in the closet

in the hall

and talked to itself about the dog

that once ran its tongue

along the lid of the box

that went away when it heard

a noise

and never came back.

In the spring it discovered

it could unlearn the night and its own

imperfections.

Now, it's summer

—stuffy, warm, and deep—

and still it lies in the shoebox.

A tendril has started to dig

through the floor

drawing its strength from

the rotten wood

driving its thin brain steadily

into the other side of consciousness.

If we listened, we might

hear its heaving

comically serious

                Bulgarian

weightlifter grunts—feel

the house slip.

...

Our morning read here at Today's book of poetry was a little quieter than normal.  It is an overcast Saturday morning here in Ottawa and some of our staff phoned in with the Friday night flu.  Today's book of poetry likes to think we are an understanding employer and have decided not to flog any of them.  But they will pay.

Tom Moore would understand.

I put India Arie on the box with her version of "The Creator Has A Master Plan," the Pharoah Sanders classic.  Everyone in the office knew it was time for business and gathered round.  When India finished I read Acceptable Time to the troops.  Even Max stayed for the duration.

Max's approval carries a lot of weight here and it certified my contention, Tom Moore impressed us all day long.

Elegy

Sometimes the body has done enough.

It's not that the flesh

doesn't care

what the soul might have wanted

or for those who've come

by thinking

they could help—

it's because of all the partial deaths

that have happened before that

the last's made almost

irrelevant.

If the flesh could talk to the soul, it might

ask why, with skin flaking off and the

breasts having out-lived

their usefulness

it should go on?

Yet the soul can't answer

these or any other questions.

After midnight

the halls quiet down—

even the bacteria yawn.

Perhaps she would have heard

the bags of fluid beeping

as the bodies were washed by hand

or from somewhere far away

the echo of a flood tide, booming.

When the end finally came the

details of her death must

have been quite

extraordinary

like the glint she saw on a

metal hinge, the 

railing as

the light descended.

...

Today's book of poetry played the full four poem Monty today because Mr. Moore earned it.  Acceptable Time is a remarkable little book that punches way above its weight.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Tom Moore is a Senior Instructor of Liberal Studies at Western Washington University.

ravennapress.com

691

DISCLAIMERS

Poems cited here are assumed to be under copyright by the poet and/or publisher.  They are shown here for publicity and review purposes.  For any other kind of re-use of these poems, please contact the listed publishers for permission.

We here at TBOP are technically deficient and rely on our bashful Milo to fix everything.  We received notice from Google that we were using "cookies"

and that for our readers in Europe there had to be notification of the use of those "cookies.  Please be aware that TBOP may employ the use of some "cookies" (whatever they are) and you should take that into consideration

Poems for New Orleans — Edward Sanders (North Atlantic Books)

Today's book of poetry:
Poems for New Orleans.  Edward Sanders.  North Atlantic Books.  Berkeley, California.  2008.

Edward (Ed) Sanders is our third favourite Sanders in the world.  Pharoah Sanders will always win that race and Bernie Sanders is an ace example of how the best of us comes to live in one hard working soul.  Third place doesn't sound like much of a prize but Today's book of poetry has long admired Mr. Edward Sanders, the poet.

Edward Sanders wears a lot of hats.  You've probably heard of his culture crashing musical group The Fugs.  Sanders opened the famous Peace Eye Bookstore in New York, and was on the ground in San Francisco when Beat met Hippie.  His bibliography is longer than my arm.

So I was disappointed when Milo came back from the stacks with only one Edward Sanders collection.  Today's book of poetry has a first printing of Sanders first publication, Poem From Jail (A City Lights Publication, 1963), but that was it.  Milo, our head tech and book scout, has been tasked with filling in those huge Sanders gaps in our library.

Poems for New Orleans continues Sanders long history of investigative poetry and it is a Katrina induced HOWL.  Poems for New Orleans is full of Sanders encyclopedic research and tempered by a lengthy residence in situ in the Big Easy.

Today's book of poetry thinks we should all agree that pound for pound, there may be no more famous town on earth.  New Orleans is a town that has inflamed the imaginations and compelled discovery for generations.  From a swamp-stop-tent-town to a modern metropolis.  And into that Sanders brings William Blake for a look around, has Mark Twain twang and Lee Harvey take a stroll, mourns the loss of a beloved Magnolia tree, hates FEMA and sings wildly into the chorus we all know, songs for the everyman.

Marie Lebage and Huey Long

Her name was Marie Lebage

She was a school teacher

and she worked in the campaign of Huey Long

                                                                       in 1928

At first she didn't really know why

but then she just got swept up

She was the great granddaughter of Lemoine Lebage

who fought alongside Andy Jackson in the Battle of New Orleans

Marie had young kids

and the State of Louisiana charged money for textbooks

but when Huey Long became governor

he not only made the textbooks free

he started giving black teachers the same money as whites

Could it be that Huey was a savior?

She was sick of the generations of

post-slaver whites who always had one tune to sing:

"Don't give those black folk, not a dime

That will come another time"

It's hard to pick a fight with greed

when greed is such a seed

but in the middle of the Depression

she watched the right wing

rise up with hatchets of hatred

as only the right can do

Ask the Gracchi of ancient Rome

Marie already knew about hatred

She'd faced up the klan

ever after they put death fliers

on her porch in the Lower 9th

But the slavers really hated Huey

They snarled he was a pawn of Marx

but Marie Lebarge was totally certain

that Huey Long's slogan "Share Our Wealth"

came from the sermons of Jesus

and Jefferson's love of revolution.

She took the bus to Baton Rouge

on a stark September day of '35

She was part of a choral group that was singing

the anthem Huey had written

                                             "Every Man a King"

by the front steps of the capitol

when the Kingfish was gunned to the stone

even though he was surrounded by bodyguards

A dead savior is a dead savior

and nothing was left but a cash-starved machine

and a president headed for war

            (chant)

It's hard to pick a fight with greed

When greed is such a seed

for Greed loves bullets

like water loves pullets

and down dives luck and pluck

like a Pontchartrain duck

...

Poems for New Orleans offers up some alternative views as to what the true history of the magic town could be.  Sanders is willing to imagine a different and a better future for New Orleans but sometimes he needs fantasy to do it.  

Edward Sanders has a honed, hair-trigger sense of humour, a sense of duty in honouring history, and a bigger sense of responsibility than most about the hubris of those responsible for the human tragedy during and after Katrina.  That's a lot to put into one book of poems and Sanders knows it.  But clearly Sanders has paid the price of admission, spent double-time on his homework.

Today's book of poetry was never quite able to figure out the lyrics to the Tragically Hip song "New Orleans is Sinking" but I thought we should play it on the morning rotation along with Don McLean's "American Pie."  McLean knew about the levies and more.  Arlo Guthrie sang about "The City of New Orleans" so he had to be included as well.

Then we thought Dixieland, then Zydeco, then all hell broke loose.  Kathryn, our Jr. Editor, and Maggie, our new intern, were both dancing with Milo.  Max opened his office door and a blue wall of what looked like a heavy fog rolled out behind him, he waltzed over to the gyrating threesome and put down some John Travolta moves that jaw-dropped the room.  Then, he spun around, returned to his office murmuring something about emptying the swamps, history of evil, alligators not being the worst beast that slithered, and his door shut with a blue wisp halo around the edges of his office door.

Edward Sanders studied Greek in university and isn't shy about bringing in some of the Greek gods to stir things up, Greek historians too.  Sanders knows that New Orleans is bigger than any one tragedy, it has endured a million sorrows and if the soil had memory it would be weeping blood.  Yet Poems for New Orleans remains a celebratory incantation to the future to remember; and it is a bit of a prayer.  As Heraclitus said: "No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man."

Echoes of Heraclitus

Four days I sat in the attic
with 27 cans of beans
we were going to use on Labor Day
and some coca cola I drank very slowly
                                                       to make it last

Finally I bashed and bashed
with a can
till I created enough of a breach
to pry open the smallest slit in the roof

O my God!
one of my neighbors was floating with
her hair entangled in a tree limb

A helicopter flew me away
I wound up in Utah
where I'm waiting for Jesus
or anybody

to help me home.

That's what my mother always said:
The rivers always pours toward poverty
You can't lose the same house twice

but once you get to heaven
the water makes God's bread to leaven.

...

Our morning read here at Today's book of poetry was tempered by my poor sleep last night.  Today's book of poetry's biggest fan and supporter is in Montreal for a few days and the place feels empty without her.  But the crew gave Poems for New Orleans a good rally around the flag and that cheered me immensely.  Sanders encouraged a vibrant reading with his splendid narratives and tender heart.

Today's book of poetry would be remiss if we didn't extend an extreme bow to Edward Sanders along with a "Thank You Sir" in the robust and genuine style of one of Rob McLennan.  Sanders has been on the poetry beat for a long, long time and his poetry still feels fresh, immediate and necessary.

Ironing Board

They took a picture of Gandhi's personal possessions
at the time of his killing
a pair of glasses, a robe, sandals
                                       & maybe a water jar

Not much more.

I feel the same way most of the time now
that all my stuff has washed away in the flood
I'm Free of those toilsome burdens
free of my doormouse diaries
free of my kitchen cabinet
                          & its ancient hippie tea from 1969

but I can't help it—
I miss my ironing board

and the letters you used to send me
                                           after we were beaten in Selma

...

Edward Sanders has been publishing his brand of anarchy and beauty to appreciative audiences for over half a century.  It hasn't gotten old yet.

Today's book of poetry is proud to introduce Sanders to some of you younger readers.  For any of you old enough to remember "I Love Lucy" Sanders will be a poet you know like an old friend you can depend on.  Edward Sanders was present back in the day, he remains a vibrant people's poet, a necessary voice.

Edward Sanders

Edward Sanders

Back in the day.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Edward Sanders was a founding member of the seminal bohemian rock band The Fugs and a prominent figure in the 60s counterculture. He is the author of numerous books of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction, including the bestselling study of Charles Manson, The Family. The winner of a number of writing awards, including a Guggenheim and an NEA fellowship, he lives in Woodstock, NY.

BLURBS

"Ed Sanders—poet, Pentagon levitator, classics scholar, founding member of the Fugs—is a political force in Woodstock, New York."
—Hendrik Hertzberg, The New Yorker

“No poet today writes history better than Ed Sanders. From the Duke of Orleans’ fragile grouping of houses in 1718, to wealth and heights with Mardi Gras and fun without guilt, to the storm of Katrina, the bard of our continent gives us the truth with these poems and songs.”
—Joanne Kyger, author of About Now: Collected Poems

“Sanders the poet-maestro of American history excels his own lyrical genius with the truth beams he sends flashing in Poems for New Orleans.”
—Michael McClure, author of Scratching the Beat Surface

“A magisterial suite of poems tracing the Crescent City from its founding in 1718 through the ravages of Hurricane Katrina, Poems for New Orleans is a vertical history in verse, recalling Charles Olson’s Gloucester and William Carlos Williams’s Paterson."
—Nina Shengold, Chronogram Magazine

“The bad handling of Hurricane Katrina is a central point of this book, but more importantly, Sanders also sheds light on the after-effects and the suffering it imposed on those who were displaced. This type of ‘investigative poetics’ is not new territory for Sanders… [H]e has put his best foot forward to cover one of America’s greatest tragedies. The book is interspersed with sharp, quick-witted shorter works that glue the larger poems into a taught fabric; the shorter poems represent an alternate poetic frequency and outlook that allows the larger, more musical poems to mesh exceptionally well.… Poems for New Orleans provides a much-deserved helping of poetic justice.”
—Darrin Daniel, Rain Taxi

“Ed Sanders, in his Poems for New Orleans, leads us at one point to imagine the goddess Athena reappearing to intercede for yet another place where ‘something has shamed justice.’ The work is, as he says, ‘a prayer for the victims’ of this injustice. But it is also a Prophetic Book, an eloquent cry of righteous indignation. And it is an Apologia for the Polis, a celebration of the Queen City, the Fertile Crescent, with its richness of culture, history and humanity. In producing this extraordinary work, Sanders has combined the patient labors of the engaged historian with the creative inspiration of the poet.  The Poems enlighten the reader about the thick particularities of real, lived history, especially through the narrative ribbon of the deeply moving Lebage family history that runs through the work. At the same time, they enchant the reader with the magic of the place, so that one can well imagine the visionary Blake crossing paths with the Voodoo Priestess Marie Laveau. Sanders brings to the scene of the crime and the dramatic landscape diverse skills, ranging from those of an Investigative Poet to those of a Rhapsodic Historian.  The Poems reveal that he has gained a deep and empathetic knowledge of the city's history, its people, and its complex personality, that he has intently ‘listened to the whispering of its secret mind.’ ”
—John P. Clark, Gregory F. Curtin Distinguished Professor in Humane Letters and the Professions at Loyola University New Orleans

Edward Sanders

Poems for New Orleans

"The Battle of New Orleans"

Video: ParisRecordsVideo

northatlanticbooks.com

687

DISCLAIMERS

Poems cited here are assumed to be under copyright by the poet and/or publisher.  They are shown here for publicity and review purposes.  For any other kind of re-use of these poems, please contact the listed publishers for permission.

We here at TBOP are technically deficient and rely on our bashful Milo to fix everything.  We received notice from Google that we were using "cookies"

and that for our readers in Europe there had to be notification of the use of those "cookies.  Please be aware that TBOP may employ the use of some "cookies" (whatever they are) and you should take that into consideration