Oblivious / More On "Glut "/Petaluma Poetry Walk, City Lights, etc.

Oblivious by Eddie C.


Petaluma Poetry Walk
& 2 Other Readings

Ed Coletti will be reading at

Petaluma Poetry Walk - Sept 21st
with Michael Rothenberg & Terry
Carrion at the Apple Box 6 Petaluma
Blvd N. at 1 PM.
Diane DiPrima
will read at Apple Box the following
hour. Here's a link to the full
2 pg Poetry Walk Brochure.

City Lights Books - SF - October 13th at 7PM - Avanti
Populo Reading - In addition to
Ed Coletti, also the great Diane Di
Prima, James Tracy, Kim Nicolini,
Cameron McHenry and Giovanna Capone.

Arrividerchi Restaurant - San Rafael - Monday Nov. 3d - 6 PM - Ed Coletti and great Italian Food!



Triolet On Time

“For boys add to their woe by sitting still”
Was the best line of my youthful poem.
Now age and illness ask again why will
Such boys add to their woe by sitting still?
You’d think of this they’d had their awful fill
And, dreaming dreams of life they’d finally sow them.
“For boys add to their woe by sitting still”
Was the best line of my youthful poem.


(October 13, 1985 - uncovered July 08)

Comment Here on any of the above or below and read the comments of others too. Log in under "Name" or "Anonymous" if you like, but please be sure to sign some facsimile of your name. Actual name is best, but use what you like. Or email me at edcoletti@sbcglobal.net if you have difficulty.

More On So Called "Glut" Of Writers

It took awhile, but I finally got Poets & Writers to get me the following very interesting article on our recent subject of supply and demand. By the way, many of you believe (correctly) that it's better to have lots of artists rather than lots of almost anything else. I, of course, agree. And none of us is going to stop writing just because there are so many of us, however...


The Law of Diminishing Readership

by Joseph Bednarik
As marketing director of Copper Canyon Press, the thirty-four-year-old independent publisher of poetry in Port Townsend, Washington, I am required to read a lot. While most of the titles on my reading list are poetry collections, I recently read two nonfiction texts that got me thinking about the "economics" of creative writing.

So Many Books: Reading and Publishing in an Age of Abundance (Paul Dry Books, 2003), by Mexican poet and business consultant Gabriel Zaid, and Reading at Risk, the sobering report published by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) in 2004, articulate the challenges faced by the swelling legions of creative writers longing to find a readership. Consider the following statements extrapolated from Zaid's book and the NEA report:

1. Production of creative writing far exceeds consumer demand.

2. Accredited MFA programs in creative writing continue to proliferate, while the practice of literary reading is in steady decline.

3. Many publishers require underwriting to produce and distribute literary titles because sales do not support production costs.

4. Publishers can, with relative ease, attract a thousand manuscript submissions-plus reading fees-by sponsoring book contests.

What's wrong with this picture? If you're running an MFA program, a book contest, or a writer's workshop, or selling other goods and services that support the writer's life-absolutely nothing. If you want your book published and read by an audience other than friends and family-everything.

In a statistical mood, I once estimated how many "good poems" were being produced by recent graduates of MFA programs. Keeping all estimates conservative, I figured there had to be at least 450 poets graduating nationwide each year. If each MFA graduate wrote just one good poem a year for ten years, at the end of a decade we would have 24,750 good poems-not to mention 4,500 degree-bearing poets, each of whom was required to write a book-length manuscript in order to graduate. New poems, poets, and manuscripts are added to the inventory every year.

Read Complete Bednarik Article

Here's someone attempting to disprove the title of this site -- "No Money In Poetry"

POETS REFINE MONEY

after reading in Baltimore, photo credit Michael Ball

There are thousands of Americans everyday who are looking for a safe place to invest their money. Poets are the best source for removing negative charge from your wealth, and raising the collective conscience of the planet. You can change your life FOREVER by sponsoring a poet today! CAConrad is one such American poet serious about making poetry a lifelong quest, ready and willing to refine your money! If you are interested in sponsoring this poet, call (215)563-3075, or write to CAConrad13@AOL.com. You won't believe the difference a poet will make!

Comment Here on any of the above or below and read the comments of others too. Log in under "Name" or "Anonymous" if you like, but please be sure to sign some facsimile of your name. Actual name is best, but use what you like. Or email me at edcoletti@sbcglobal.net if you have difficulty.

No Poetry In Money Either

(art by eddie 2008)











The Operative Word Is “Skillions”

Because of the network of creative writing workshops,
there are skillions of good new young poets each year
...and no money in it. (Richard Silberg 7/11/08)

So is the world a better place for this?
There was a time I craved coffee houses
with Italian espresso machines
like in North Beach and Greenwich Village,
And it took such a long time
but we got them with a Starbucks
on every block in San Rafael and Stockton,
Coffee so burned that overroasting
became the standard for mediocrity
unchallenged until skillions of MFA
poets competed to cave-dwell
in cramped musty corners —
New Yorker, Poetry, Paris Review,
VQR, Prairie Schooner, Kenyon Review —
And so it goes with coffee and with poetry.

- Ed Coletti / July 2008

The following response comes from friend and wonderful poet Jack Crimmins

Ed, thanks for the ancient Chinese madman poem (See Du Fu's poem below and also Jack Crimmins' poem "The End of Poetry.")! I liken it somewhat to your ancient Open Mike Max madman poem which I think captures City Max very well.

And re "Skillions", it is very interesting to me at this time about the world of poets, poems and money.

The poet Jack Gilbert has said that money ruined poetry, i.e. that the money in it for those who make it; teaching at universities, publishing w/trade presses, big prizes (gary snyder just won $100, 000 from somebody), has made poets keep producing the same work/ same books over and over, when sometimes they had only one good book early on but needed to keep going to make money.

And Silliman cries out that the big publishers keep giving the prizes to writers who publish with their presses, like Robert Haas, cuz it keeps people buying their books.

And money, lack of money, lately has me asking myself questions about my own publishing. Whether to put one's own money into books, then hawk them oneself, and really thinking I probably won't do that much more. There are so many poets now that to find a publisher that is willing to pay for producing a book is a crap shoot, and highly unlikely w/out moving in the right circles, mostly teaching, or some kind of post-avant press world, or getting a huge write-up from Silliman.

Which then makes me question why then write poems except for the joy of it. Jack Gilbert only published a few books, in part saying he thinks publishing takes some of the joy out of poetry. Of course, if one doesn't publish, there is no money, no anything, except the joy of writing.

Which then makes me think, why not go body surfing instead? Anyhow, check out the attached poem.

Best, jack


I Am a Madman

My thatched cottage stands
just west of Thousand Mile Bridge

this Hundred Flower Stream
would please a hermit fisherman

bamboo sways in the wind
graceful as any court beauty

rain makes the lotus flower
even more red and fragrant

but I no longer hear from friends
who live on princely salaries

my children are always hungry
with pale and famished faces

does a madman grow more happy
before he dies in the gutter?

I laugh at myself -- a madman
growing older, growing madder.

- Du Fu (712 - 770)

The End of Poetry

emptiness no emptiness
done again
with words done
fire outside of time
the shallow end
pools of desert water
fool’s gold
a fever
in the mountains
a fortune found
writing again
emptiness no emptiness

~ Jack Crimmins / January 18, 2008

Comment Here on any of the above or below and read the comments of others too. Log in under "Name" or "Anonymous" if you like, but please be sure to sign some facsimile of your name. Actual name is best, but use what you like. Or email me at edcoletti@sbcglobal.net if you have difficulty.

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