Novel Cartoon/Poet & Reader/Hoo Doo Dog/Acceptances in Journals/Two Maria De Los Angeles Paintings/

The Poet and His Reader

"The transaction that we call the experience of poetry always takes place between one being and another. The energy circulates from privacy to privacy. Far flung though they may be in space and time, the poet and his reader are, for the duration of the experience, adjacent souls with permeable boundaries. Language can render the inward experience so persuasively that the space/time axis yields. Poetry has no larger 'public function' — it's limits are set. Poetry readings may be good advertising but they can't alter the monogamous character of the real event. In poetry, as in love, two is company, three is always a crowd."

from Sven Birkerts in his essay "The Poet In An Age Of Distraction"

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When I Was Transformed Into The Hoo Doo Dog
 Before I knew what was happening, David Madgalene had effected this transformation of me into one of his most nefarious characters or, rather into the head I'd once painted of that character, The Hoo Doo Dog!  Read more here!




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Ed Coletti: Recent Journal Acceptances

Steve Jobs' Glasses                                        California Qtrly Review            Wntr  2014

Bologna Station Caffé                                   Curator                                       Aug   2014

these old instrumental sugar blues                Bohemia                                     May   2014

 Much More Than Road Kill                         Lummox                                     Nov.   2014

-Big Bill’s I-Ching of What Sex Is

-Bukowski Makes Me Happy

-Born Yesterday

-When I Fall In Love

-Please Aerate the Poetry                               Zombie Logic Review                            March 2014

Schrodinger’s Cat                                           Ambush Rev.                              March 2014

-Take Care

-Accordion Dirge                                           Heyday Magazine                       March 2014

Dead Career                                                    Penny Ante Review                    March 2014

Quiet Now                                                      Blueline                                     Spring 2014

-When I’m a Small Bird Floating

-I’m Not Telling a Story I’m Writing a

   Poem Damn It                                              The Brooklyn Rail                        Aug  2014

-The Queen’s Interlude

-Monkey Business                                          So It Goes – The Literary Journal

                                                                        of the Kurt Vonnegut Memorial

                                                                        Library Issue 2                              Jan.  2014

S.O.B (Fiction)                                               Noir Nation                                   2014

Anh (Fiction)                                                  Romance Magazine                      2014         

Tetzel Box                                                      East Coast Literary Review          2013         

On Plumbing Following A Divorce               North American Review               2014

The Poet As Survivor Assistance Officer      Journal Of Military Experience -  2013

Freight Train                                                  Lummox                                  Oct or Nov 2013

-Lying on a Chair Swing in August               Edwin E. Smith Q.                  Spring 2014

-New Years Eve                                                          

-Once Upon A Time In China

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2 Paintings by Maria de Los Angeles

Maria De Los Angeles emigrated from Mexico to the United States in 1999. She currently resides in New Haven Connecticut and attends MFA in Painting and Printmaking at Yale University. In 2013 received a BFA in Painting from Pratt Institute. Maria works in a variety of media including oil,acrylic painting, etching, woodcut, drawing and sculpture. Current works reflect her interest in  narratives both Allegorical and time base with the symbolic use of color, form and objects.

Maria's paintings are for sale  MdLAfineart@gmail.com

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Women Poets April Madness/Jack ("Finnegan") Hirschman Poem/

Hilarity From Powell Books in Portland, Or.

If it's April, it's... Poetry Madness! Last April at Powell's, we pitted 64 poets against one another in a Tina Turner-style cage match to determine The Best Poet of All Time. As you'd expect, it wasn't pretty. Poets from all eras and every corner of the globe arrived armed with their meaty metaphors and their monster rhymes, ready to whoop some poet butt.  But the most dangerous weapon of all? The dash. Our victor in the epic battle known as  Poetry Madness was, of course, Ms. Emily Dickinson.​Since a woman defeated all comers last year, we decided to up the ante. In conjunction with #readwomen2014, this year's Poetry Madness will feature only female poets. To keep it fair, our reigning champion will sit this one out and act instead as moderator of the event. So, without further ado, your host, Ms. Emily Dickinson: Poets play their hunger games— It's right there in their genes— But add a little estrogen— And they'll get downright mean— That's why I'm here, the best poet, please call me Emily— To remind you, though a contest— Ladies, keep it clean— The brackets This year, the poets are organized into four divisions: Dragons, Sharks, Wolverines, and Vipers. To vote in the first round of matchups, scroll to the bottom of the page. Good luck, and may the best poet win!  Note: For a printable bracket, click here. View last year's bracket here. Questions? Comments? Send emails to poeticjustice@powells.com.

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San Francisco Poet Laureate Emeritus and Poet-In Residence at the SF Public Library Jack Hirschman provides this wonderfully witty poem wherein he employs the style of Finnegan's Wake to right onederfly offalrongs.

THE WANPA SCENT ARCANE

1.

The wanpa scent’s

the smell of all stinksomeness,

the morder of all vowels

to make a bowel of turds

that defeckshate on

all who roccupy

against the stench

of the rot of the rat

at the root of the deathrattle

of Ruinoil Regoon,

the shitasson 

of that carwreckter assassin

Retchard Noxon the door

like Death, who ambitched

to power on the flaming

red body of Hell in Gahuggun

Dickless, the first

of meany witchhaunts,

ant taught that lamebrain

Gonzo how to knife

The People in the buck.

These are the

heads of the swine corpse

against our shoccupy.

They’re who give the cops

who beat you

their clubs.

They’re gunsells all,

from Gangwretch

to Snitchromnay

and in fact so is

Obummer, the sad drip

of the Capuddlist Potty, who,

while you and yours

were singing

“Y’all lang zine”

was signing the Endeeayay

and disappearing your lieberty.

You’re in fatshits America now,

you’re a hebe without Habeas,

a carnal without Corpus.

You can be harrasted

for the crumb of being

part of a tahririst plot.

And he’s depotted

foehundread-thousand

people so that the Statue

hasn’t stopped weeping

downcheeks and allover

Emma’s Lasarussian poem

since the start of the year.

Nothing could be worser

than a hearse of humane verses

all in mourning.

2.

So it’s amnasty to an Ind,

this kartun,

and where’s Moe Zez 

 to shofar it to?

It’s amneotic destuning,

the tear of your ear off,

the tumult of your scorn.

                       Ha!

Shem will strike you

lightning-fast,

you won’t even know what

hate you, you’ll be

fatelly down for the count,

but at the sound of ten

your hand’ll become a hundred

with a manifasttalking

destribuning again.

Uppenadam, moccupiers,

once dead ducks, now

feenixes on fire

transflaming ovarythang

tombey in the womb

of tomarrow

into a whole new bowl game

where the thrallest

to feel is when

throwing out the fierst bull

at the start of god,

for we’ve taken refuse at lost

and gone to the fear end

of Occupy

(Kiyippee Kiyay!),

we who’ve tam-tummed

and zim-zummed

and now are scribabbling

everywhere to spring

the checkmates of the world

from the jail

the whimper sentenced

to life without parole.

                         - Jack Hirschman

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Cool Poem From My Son/Sondheim On Music vs. Poetry/Calder's Environment/Ed's Pelican/Writing(humor)

Cool poem from my son, notable NYC poet, John Coletti in the 3-17-13 edition of Everyday Genius.

Dukes Up
by John Coletti

The Easter egg hunt
inherently cruel
religiously obscene
“I see one.” “Let me get one.”
tears. like that.
an epiphenomenelogical account from like organisms
teasing @ the homegrown
in a banged-up locker
that convince me, at the end of darknessses
that I want to enjoy being family-kept-spilling
I never understate
& demonstrate daily
the capital shock then “wooed
& won by wireless”
weeds I thought more beautiful tilted
like a panix’ serpent
calming
core doubts. it’s been a little rough.
pancakes at midnight
pancakes at day
Medieval reenactors
dragging
that one aria
from Turandot
around your eye. forever closed
the tingling of clean, crystal lights
then I laid back down. don’t rot: sayeth Beaker
the tendered non-capital evening so eschewed
now, I have a third wave: Starting fresh!


John Coletti is the author of Deep Code (City Lights, forthcoming 2014), Skasers, a half-book with Anselm Berrigan (Flowers & Cream 2012), Mum Halo (Rust Buckle Books 2010), Same Enemy Rainbow (fewer & further 2008), and Physical Kind (Yo-Yo-Labs 2005).  He has served as editor of The Poetry Project Newsletter and co-edits Open 24 Hours Press. Other projects include a collaborative print with artist Kiki Smith, a chapbook collaboration with Shana Moulton, and a libretto for Excelsior, an opera composed by Caleb Burhans commissioned by Chicago’s Fifth House Ensemble, which premiered in 2013.

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What Stephen Sondheim Has to Say About Music vs Poetry

Music straightjackets a poem and prevents it from breathing on its own, whereas it liberates a lyric.  Poetry doesn't need music; lyrics do."

" 'Poetry seems to me to exist in terms of its conciseness - how much can be packed in,' he told Bernard Levin in 1980.  'Lyric writing has to exist in time...Therefore it must be crystal clear as it goes on.' "

"I firmly believe that lyrics have to breathe and give the audience's ear a chance to understand what's going on.  Particularly in the theater, where you not only have the music, but you've got costume, story, acting, orchestra.  There's a lot to take in.  The whole idea of poetry is denseness, is concision, is abutment of images, and that sort of thing.  You can't do that when you've got music going, and expect the audience to take it in."

"Poetry is something that you can go back and read multiple times to extract its meaning.  But with lyrics, you hear them once, and they have to stick." 

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 Alexander Calder Piece

Submitted by Deetje Boler who enjoyed my poem "How The Gulf Felt" (see below) from my book Germs, Viruses, and Catechisms (historicowarpoligious poems) published by Civil Defense Publications (SF Dec. 2013)

How The Gulf Felt to Me and a Pelican

                       

I felt this same wretched way

the day the grove behind our house

fell and continued to fall to chainsaws,

the same way I felt when George W. Bush

responded to 9/11 by invading hapless Iraq,

the same way I’d felt when my father died,

the same way I’d felt when that wildwood

behind our house where the scrub oaks

as old as our nation fell beneath chainsaws.

The birds I’d come to venerate,

the juncos, woodpeckers, finches

with no home here to return to

simply disappeared along with

the oak trees to become

markets, restaurants, realtors,

coffee shops and a yoga studio.

And oil well may prove to be

the very worst substance ever

put to use by the not-so-human

infant machine we refer to as

a “brain” this engine that may conceive

one great poem or painting

for every million barrels of

gloppy goo fouling the very subject

such slime predicates to slow

tortured death not to mention

each and every act of corruption,

all the wars fought for

this hideous bloody slop,

all of this here and now

summarized in the agony

of one more dazed helpless

pelican.

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"juice" by Wanda Morrow Clevenger /Lynne Knight "Advice"/Interview With Ed Coletti/New Book Germs, Viruses, and Catechisms/

Old Photo Of Germs, Viruses, and Catechisms author
(Please see interview below) with even older friend in Oaxaca.


This poem by Wanda Marie Clevenger
was recently published in Rattle, and it very nicely 
ties in with our own title No Money In Poetry.

juice

by Wanda Morrow Clevenger

no one doubts if

I've got

what poetry takes

more than

editors

when I don't

hardcore cuss

because

the syllables 

bleed feeble

don’t go

Dita Von Teese

don't get

how I don't

squeeze juice

from

catfish tits

no one doubts

more

than

when I say

another poem

got picked up

today

did you make any money,

he says

no, I say

or yes when Every Day Poets

tosses a dollar

into the till

let me know

when we're rich,

he says

Published in Rattle Issue 42 – November 2013

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and, from Lynne Knight in that same strong
Rattle Issue 42 – November 2013

"Several years ago, I met the poet Anna Rabinowitz just before the opera made from her book Darkling was about to tour Europe.  When I said how wonderful it must have been to get a phone call from someone who wanted to turn her poems into an opera, she smiled. "You never know what's going to happen' she said, 'So just sit at your desk and do your work.' That's the best advice any writer has ever given me. No operas on the horizon, but at least the poems keep showing up."

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Coletti Interview 

Publisher James Tracy of Civil Defense Publications conducted an interview with Ed Coletti following the publication of his new book, Germs, Virsuses, and 
Catechisms (historicowarpligious poems).  Here are the questions to which
Coletti responds.  Note: Folks are finding this interview quite enlightening!         

1.  What inspired you to start writing poetry? What inspires you do keep doing it?
2.  How is Germs different than your other volumes? Do you think that your readers will be surprised by some of the ground you cover there?
3.  What are the best ways for poets who want to address political issues to avoid sounding didactic?
4.   Your work in Germs is some of your most skeptical of power and government. What led you to this point?
5.  One of your poems, Columbus, the Mafia and Denial as a poem from an Italian-American as it casts a critical eye on your heritage. Does your IA ancestry influence your outlook? Why or Why Not?
6.  If you could go back in time and have dinner with any seven dead poets, who would they be? (this is my favorite question) 

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Ed Coletti's Germs, Viruses, and Catechisms Published December 2013 by Civil Defense Publications (San Francisco)

As you well can imagine, it was difficult finding a press interested in publishing a political ( in this case "historicowarpoligious") poetry book.  I'm very pleased and humbled by CDP's acceptance and all that publisher James Tracy has done!

http://www.amazon.com/Germs-Viruses-Catechisms-historicalwarpoligious-Pocketbooks/dp/0978691393/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1387481432&sr=8-1&keywords=ed+coletti

Ger
Here's what Jonah Raskin wrote,

“Ed Coletti is at the top of his form in Germs, Viruses, and Catechisms, a collection of irreverent, sacrilegious verse that might become infectious, and that could become a kind of contemporary catechism. Playful and punning, satirical and lyrical, political and whimsical, Coletti’s brave new book brings together Crazy Horse and Joe Gallo, Columbus and George Bush. The lists are funny; the imagery of war and torture is absolutely wild. There are surprises here, too, as in “Hypatia of Alexandria,” a wild and wonderful poem that offers a heretical heroine for our own crazy, brave times.” 

                       

- Jonah Raskin, author of The Radical Jack London and Rock ‘n’ Roll Women, Portraits of a Generation.

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