About Last Saturday's Reading

Last Saturday's reading at Modern Formations Gallery went well and any trepidation I had about reading for the first time in over 20 years rapidly evaporated as the poems took over. Because there were so many readers (14), we were limited to 8 minutes apiece, which made things even easier. I had decided early on that I would do a combination of poems from Lilliput, in recognition of this 20th anniversary year, with a few of my own to finish up. This is another instance that working in the short form really paid off.

I thought I'd share the Lilliput poems I read with you in today's post. Selecting the poems for reading really highlighted some differences between the long and short forms. Most poems of 10 lines or less really don't have public presentation as a primary goal; it's no stretch to say the short poem is generally not designed for public readings. There really isn't enough time to pick up a rhythm, get up some steam, and deliver the goods. The poem is over before you know it.

That doesn't mean that poets don't bring considerable talents in matters such as rhythm, meter, word sound, rhyme and more to the short poem to make them amenable to reading aloud. In fact, if a short poem doesn't bring some poetic device(s), it is in real danger of appearing to be an aphorism or even just a wise (or wise ass) remark. So, in going through the Lillie archives I went in search of certain types of short poems and, happily, found them in reasonable abundance. As a result, the poems I selected actually are not representative of the magazine as a whole, just a certain aspect of that magazine.

It didn't make much sense to get up and read work that wasn't designed in a way for reading and wouldn't connect in that type of setting. As a result, what follows was specifically chosen for the reading and, from the response, seemed to go over fairly well. It was a real challenge to present the work of other poets and to do the work justice.





springtime in a city park

look at them all
carrying weight and shoes
and pants,
briefcases and glasses.
a cigarette slowly lifted
to the lips.
sunlight on a youthful book
open.
hope.
look at them all
they're so fucking beautiful.

Charlie Mehrhoff, LR #48

business as usual

money says have a nice day

money says bark like a dog

money says bark like a dog
and roll over

money says blame each other

money says have another biscuit

Don Wleklinski, LR #153

The Arrival

We have arrived without luggage
in a country we don't recognize
among people who distrust us
where the walls have no windows
and the doors open only
for the chosen. Welcome home.

David Chorlton, LR #145

Apple

Sometimes when eating an apple
I bite too far
and open the little room
the lovers have prepared,
and the seeds fall
onto the kitchen floor
and I see
they are tear-shaped.

Jay Leeming, LR #72

I RIP OFF YOU, YOU RIP OFF ME, WE RIP OFF THEM
THAY RIP OFF US, THAY RIP ME OFF, I RIP OFF THEM
YOU RIP OFF THEM, THAY RIP OFF YOU, HE RIPS OFF
ME, I RIP OFF HIM, HE RIPS OFF YOU, YOU RIP OFF
HIM, WE RIP OFF HIM, HE RIPS OFF US, I RIP OFF
HER, SHE RIPS OFF ME, SHE RIPS OFF YOU, YOU RIP
OFF HER, I RIP OFF ME, YOU RIP OFF YOU, THAY RIP
OFF THEMSELVES, I FOLLOW YOU, YOU FOLLOW ME AND
SO ON DOWN THE LINE, THAY HYPNOTIZE US, THAY
HYPNOTIZE US, I HYPNOTIZE YOU

John Harter, LR #106

THE LIBRARIAN ASKED
CAN YOU WAIT
FOR THAT BOOK
ON
FIFTH CENTURY
BUDDHIST STATUARY

John Harter, LR #110

Lost in the Translation

I'm impotent today she
said, closed the book
capped her pen. You can't
be impotent or potent, they
laughed. You have no penis.
She listened, and for a long
time, she believed them

Celeste Bowman, LR #89

He crept in
like mildew.

Suzanne Bowers, #59

We forget
we're mostly water
till the rain falls
and every atom
in our body
starts to go home

Albert Huffstickler, LR #116

Yawn Series of Younger Poets

annual politician of
a first book of
plums by ailing
writer under 40.
Marmosets may be
sulimated only
during February
and must be
accompanied by
a stamped, self
addressed moose

Lyn Lifshin, LR #6

your body

each piece a shining eye
examining
the rest of the explosion

scarecrow, LR #71

2003

Just before spring
--the war begins
-but - ignorant -
the pink blossoms
--keep opening
--their tiny fists

Judith Toler, LR #135

Disaster

Last night the past broke
and there was history
all over the cellar.
You should have seen it -
Rome was here, Greece was there,
Egypt floated near the ceiling -
finally I had to
call an historian:
and you know what they charge
for emergencies.

Gail White, LR #22

One Small Poem

can take you
a long way

think how far
you've come

to find
this one.

Bart Solarcyzk, LR #123

I chose not to use any haiku per se for this particular reading simply because the ones I was considering didn't make the final cut, though I did feature a number among my own poems (since it is the form I most exclusively write in these days). There were a number of great readers that evening, particularly Renée Alberts, Nikki Allen, and Jerome Crooks. I felt very fortunate to be sharing the stage with so many talented artists.

I guess I'm good for another 20 years.

the preacher's
hand gestures too...
summer trees

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don

Lilliput Review: the 20th Anniversary

Click on the cover to enlarge

Somehow, the day has arrived: it is the month of March and, incredulously, it is the 20th anniversary of Lilliput Review. I made (or perhaps that's dreamed) big plans for this moment. An anthology chapbook or, better still, a "best of" Lilliput, the first 20 years, a collection that another, adventurous press would be willing to take the risk and publish.

All of which I haven't taken step one toward.

Publishing the magazine and its imprint, Modest Proposal Chapbooks, got in the way. An impromptu haiku contest, prompted by an unexpected comment to a post about Bashô, resulted in the first annual Bashô Haiku Challenge, and a chapbook of the best work resulted (more about this below). I fell behind in getting the new issues out. There were piles of submissions to attend to. I got mixed up with Facebook and the wonderful deluge that's resulted.

To put it simply I was just too damn busy to do another thing. Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans, as the cliché goes.

And I wouldn't have it any other way.

So, for now, this post will serve as a celebration.

Lilliput started on the floor of a bungalow at the Jersey shore, amidst books and sand and ubiquitous crickets, me on my knees, cutting and pasting little bits of paper on to other little bits of paper. It was inspired by other small press publications that took that term very literally, such as Pig in a Pamphlet and This is Important. As a regularly published poet in the little magazines in the 80's, it seemed a good way to tap into the creative juices when my own poetry would hit a wall. I received the support of many other small mags, that helped to get the word out and the mag afloat. The camaraderie of the small press, which is a blessed thing and continues to this day, is something I cherish.

The first "issue," which I put together in March 1989, was essentially a test run to see if I could actually do it and what it might look like if I did. For the test run, I printed up 10 copies of 7 of my poems in a 4.25 x 5.5" format which was to be the size for the first 8 issues, before switching over to the current 3.5 x 4.25." The cover is pictured above. I won't burden you with any of the work, which was in a slightly surreal style I was sporting at the time and, though I remember it fondly and still fall back on some its stylistic anomalies, is frankly painful to read beyond the circle of two it was intended for. Succinctly put, this was a set of poems for the woman I was dating who, happily, I married. Since I seem to be bandying about clichés, I'll avoid the next one and just say she's been there with me since the beginning and her understanding, care and support have been as important as any other element to make this work. It also helps that she's spent time as a proofer and has a high tolerance for bs.

You'll notice that the original title was Lilliput Revue. The title change came with issue #2, not because I wanted to change it, but because the artist, Bobo, incorporated a "new spelling" into the artwork for the cover and I didn't have the heart to ask him for a redraw. There is much to be said for serendipity and going with the flow. Here's the cover:

Well, appropriately enough, that's the short version of the 1st 20 years. Let the party begin. I intend to celebrate all year. I'm happy to say that the entire run of 168 issues is still in print and still available. The standard rate of 15 issues for $10 is applicable; however, if anyone is interested in the entire run, query me for special pricing. The email address is at the bottom of the right hand column. If there is any publisher out there that thinks a 20th anniversary collection of the best of Lilliput makes a lot of sense, I'm listening. Meanwhile, it's time to keep on keeping on. There's lots more to do.

This past weekend, I'm happy to announce, the contributor copies of the Basho Haiku Challenge Anthology went out and should begin arriving in a mailbox near you. The chapbook, which contains 25 poems by 19 poets, is now available for $3.00, postage paid. It far surpassed my expectations and I believe any regular reader of Lillie will find much to ponder over and enjoy.

In addition, yesterday the contributor copies of issues #167 and 168 went out in the mail. Over the next couple of weeks I'll be getting out the full run of subscription copies. Individual copies of both are available for $1.00 a piece.

The same price as it was going for in 1989.

Finally, if it's Tuesday, it's back issue archive day. In the inexorable march back in time, this week we arrive at October 1993. This issue, #49, was the second of two All Women issues. Here's a sampling of what you'll find there. Enjoy.





Cover me
I'm going out
to write
a poem. Keep
firing
over my head.

Karen Alkalay-Gut

Where once they lined up

according to size, your words come
muzzled, rushing straight out of
colonial history, Master

and slave.

Gayle Elen Harvey

Empowered

is to be filled with a tank of yes

seeing behind the light of morning stars

a readiness in veins, singing through
--bone and sinew

it is all I ever wanted and didn't want
--rolled into a tight cigarette
--smoked at the end of the day

-----------------Vogn

Always

I'll keep writing
these poems
in the dark
pretending you're
near me rain falling
on my lips this flower
budding for no other
girl somewhere
inside me
a song you'll
never understand

Gina Bergamino

Quasimodos

Because we are deaf and hear stone
we make the most unbearably beautiful music.

Lorene Moore

After Forgiveness

you only come
when trees lift their branches
to kiss my wounds

Vogn

Resurrection

If there is to be a second
coming I wish it would
be Chagall

Suzanne Bowers

Fairy Tales

An ever-ever land
where happy endings
hurtle off the pages
into the emergency wards
of
our lives.

Janet Mason

best,
Don

Big Glitch and a Few Poems

Cover, w/tea stain, by Albert Huffstickler

* The above image was added afterwards, making some of what follows obsolete. *

Well, the year is starting out with a different kind of bang, not exactly one I'd hoped for or anticipated. With one issue in the rear view, another popped up immediately before I could get out of the way: computer problems.

I can't really figure out what is going on at the moment. I've been running all kind of diagnostics but the best I can sort out is that it must be some kind of virus. I can surf at the moment and minimally check email and blogger, but I don't seem to be able to upload images and when posting occasionally get broken connection messages. This may take awhile to sort out and things could be intermittent at best for the next little while.

Since today is Archive Tuesday, I'm going to try to post a few poems without the cover image. This week's trip into the past arrives at April 1994, issue #55. The further we go back in time, the wordier the work, if still limited to 10 lines. My evolution, as editor and just plain folk, is evident, at least to me. Enjoy.





Inside Spring

A robin walks across
a quiet street, as if
there's a choice.

K. Shabee

Summer

shining shining
black crow strutting
open-beaked
across the dried crumbling
street

Michael Estabrook

a new eden

time to chase god
out of the garden, restore
forests, listen again
to a wisdom of serpents
to voices of trees,
time to take on
all that terrible
knowing

Will Inman

Painting

The feeling
jumps
from deep
inside
your gut
to canvas
in a lump
of red
which will be
someone else's
sun

Suzanne Bowers

Cafe Poem

The woman in
the corner,
white on black,
white skin,
black hair,
black dress,
lights a
long, white
cigarette,
the orange flame
bright
against her cheek.

Albert Huffstickler

Looking these over, I notice I chose the most minimal, so it doesn't appear much different than usual. You'll have to trust me on the wordiness part.

I'll keep plugging away at this end, but this computer thing doesn't have a good feel. I've got all the files for Lilliput saved to a separate portable hard drive so, if I've got clean the whole disk and start from scratch, it is doable, if painful.

More soon ...


Hopefully.

Don

PS If the print size is minuscule, I apologize. See aforementioned glitch. This is my second shot at posting this; the first put an early, incomplete draft up.

Blyth's Zen Background of Haiku

Cover, replete with tea stain

Early on in the first volume of R. H. Blyth's 4 volume Haiku, he traces the origins of haiku to, among other sources, Zen. He sees it in a number of poems by Bashô, one of which is new to me, in the sense that Blyth's translation makes something I've read totally unfamiliar:

------Yield to the willow
All the loathing, all the desire
------Of your heart.

-----------------Bashô

The seeming contradiction here is consummately Zen, its underpinnings firmly grounded in nature where there is no contradiction. This translation shot to the top of the list of my favorite Bashô poems instantly.

Blyth points to a number of other Zen poems in the early history of haiku.



------The cherry blossoms having fallen,
Enjoji Temple
------Is quiet once more.

----------------------Onitsura

The irony here is the tourist crowd throngs to the the temple to see the cherry blossoms, then disappears as soon as they've fallen, leaving the temple empty. And what exactly was cherry blossom viewing supposed to remind them of, one might ask?

Buson gives another view:

-----

------The cherry blossoms having fallen,
The temple
------Through the branches.

--------------------------Buson

Blyth follows these poems with a selection of 73 poems that illustrate the path Zen traveled through poetry to arrive at the Japanese haiku. Here are a handful of my favorites, which frequently feel more like maxims than actual poems. They are unattributed:




The raindrops patter on the bashô leaf, but these
--are not tears of grief;
This is only the anguish of him who is listening
--to them.

In the vast inane there is no back or front;
The path of the bird annihilates East and West.

The water a cow drinks turns to milk;
The water a snake drinks turns to poison.

The old pine-tree speaks divine wisdom;
The secret bird manifests eternal truth.

Seeing, they see not;
Hearing, they hear not.

What is written is of ages long ago,
But the heart knows all the gain and loss.

There is no place to seek the mind;
It is like the footprints of the birds in the sky.

If you do not believe, look at September, look at October,
How the yellow leaves fall, and fill mountain and river.

Curtis Dunlap of Blogging Along Tobacco Road sent along this amazing reenactment of scenes from Bashô's journal. The first part is done with pen and ink drawings but the second part is live action film, with high production values. The live action film depicts an incident in Bashô's life that many have found very disturbing, including myself. Curtis received permission to post this response to that incident, which is well considered and worth reading. It gives us pause, not only in the life of this master poet, but in our own. Many thanks to Curtis for sharing this.







This week's trip down memory lane in the Lilliput Review archive takes us to August 1994, issue #59. Hope you find something that grabs you.




Memory

You are a dark space
in which a circle
of tiny turquoise stones
revolves endlessly.

Albert Huffstickler

Nourishment

Familiar knives carve me into
chunks served up for family dinner.
From the scraps and bones
I make a broth and feed myself.

Ruth Daigon

I Left My Future

in his car wedged between the
cushions with the seat belt-----where
it slid when neither of us were
looking or paying any attention
it is there now as I try to lie
my way out of this poem.

Cheryl Townsend

He crept in
like mildew.

Suzanne Bowers

Tried and True

1. Find out where it is.
2. Clean it, cook it, & eat it.
3. Sleep under its bones until you're awake.
4. Find another one.

bill kaul

best,
Don


PS The regular weekly archival posting will be moving to Tuesday from Thursday next week (or the week after, if this cold gets the best of me) as my evening work schedule has changed.

Robert Bly's Silence in the Snowy Fields and More

The book by Robert Bly chosen for the Near Perfect Book of Poetry list is Silence in the Snowy Fields. The book was written largely at the same time and in the same location as much of The Branch Will Not Break by James Wright. In fact, Bly is the friend referred to in The Blessing, which was featured in last Thursday's post.

As you know if you are a regular around here, the Near Perfect list is reader nominated and remains an ongoing project. As such, I don't necessarily have to agree with the choices; this is a communal thing. I hope to be featuring a poem or three from each of the nominated books by way of sharing the work valued by regular readers of poetry.

Which brings us back to Silence in the Snowy Fields. I'm a fan of Robert Bly, I think he has written more than his share of very good poems and has done more promoting the art of poetry than many of our laureates ever have. That being said, I've read Silence through twice over the past couple of months and, well, it didn't really grab me in a big way. So, this is by way of saying I'm not the final arbiter in this. I featured one poem from Silence back in July. Here are two more that stood out for me:

Watering The Horse

How strange to think of giving up all ambition!
Suddenly I see with such clear eyes
The white flake of snow
That has just fallen in the horse's mane!

Where We Must Look For Help

The dove returns: it found no resting place:
It was in flight all night above the shaken seas;
Beneath ark eaves
The dove shall magnify the tiger's bed;
Give the dove peace.
The split-tail swallows leave the sill at dawn;
At dusk, blue swallows shall return.
On the third day the crow shall fly;
The crow, the crow, the spider-colored crow,
The crow shall find new mud to walk upon.

The horses on Bly's farm played a large part in American poetry it would seem. The second poem feels pretty average until you hit the last two lines; suddenly the language rises to the image, transmutes to archetypal myth, and we are forced to see the cliche of a familiar story in a very different way.

Silence was Bly's first book and it is considered groundbreaking for its time, clearing out some of the cobwebs of what had been for many years a fairly staid American poetry scene. I'll be sharing one more poem from Silence in the coming days. For a very sizable preview of Silence in the Snowy Fields, check it out in google books.

This week's featured back issue of Lilliput Review is #60, a little different in layout and approach. It even comes with a title: "Poems Without Segues II." The whole idea was a matter of expediency; I had more poems on hand than I could, at that time, deal with, and so threw nuance to the wind and simply printed them. #60 was originally published in August 1994.

Artwork by Harland Ristau

Since the scan actually includes 6 poems from the cover (click on the image above for a readable version), I'll be featuring more poems than usual. What follows are some selections from the other 7 jam-packed pages.



breezy--
the spider's thread
warps a sunbeam

William Hart

waves break
on the cusp
of our bed--
I cradle
her moans,
moonlit
between my
crescent thighs

Janet Mason

from Rainy Day Sweetish Bakery

I think the rain
is falling
on my mother's
grave I think
it falls
very quietly.
I think there
is a tree there
and it catches
the drops
and sifts them
down
silently.

Albert Huffstickler

Ely Cathedral

Seeing you from a distance
I knew at once
O Ship of the Fens
How right it was
to make you metaphor

Hugh Hennedy

There is me
and this tree
and that bird

and there is morning.
Suzanne Bowers

trumpet curves stagelight -
the rainy street outside

christien gholson

Self Aggrandizing Poet
The head of the dead window box
flower bows away from
the grimy window in
the town with
your name.

K. Shabee

And a Brobdingnag poem from Huff:

Laundromat

This is how Hopper would have painted it:
the line of yellow dryers
catching the sunlight from the broad window.
Man with his hand reached up to the coin slot,
head turned to the side as though reflecting,
woman bent over the wide table
intent on sorting,
another standing hands at her side, looking off -
as though visiting another country;
each thing as it is,
not reaching beyond the scene for his symbols,
saying merely, "On such and such a day,
it was just as I show you."
Each person, each object, static
but the light a pilgrim.

Albert Huffstickler

best,
Don

William Wharton and Sharon Olds

It's come to my attention that one of my favorite writers, William Wharton, has died recently. Wharton is best known for his first novel Birdy (possible spoiler alert), an eccentric, moving, emotionally charged novel about the relationship of two young men growing up in the 50's and 60's. Birdy is obsessed with birds, his love at times going beyond what can be safely described as psychologically healthy. Al, his best friend, recounts his life and the story of his attempt to bring him back from the brink when he is damaged seemingly beyond repair during war .

Even more relevant for me personally was his second book Dad, which I read while my own father was going through a long, painful process of dying. It was a comfort and revelation, as sometimes only a book can be. A novel doesn't have to be by a Tolstoy or Proust to move us to the point of changing our world. This book did that and it's impossible to say how grateful I was.

Wharton himself lived a wonderful, tragic, eccentric life. I intend to post about him in some depth at the blog, Eleventh Stack, that I contribute to at my job and so will notify folks when that goes up. Though all the obituaries internationally praised him (oddly, he was beloved in Poland, having a number of works recently translated from English to Polish, including a sort of sequel to Birdy entitled Al, without ever having been published in English), he is one of those authors I believe will rapidly slip into obscurity.

I'd like to deliver one blow against the darkness for him before it finally descends.

This week is the birthday of Sharon Olds, one of the best mainstream poets writing in America today. Much of her work is intensely personal but, like all great authors, she manages to universalize the details so they resonant powerfully for her readers. Here is a poem that at once contains elements representative of her work and yet takes a somewhat different stylistic approach. Here the particular seems literally universal and there is a humor on display more overtly than is usually the case.




Topography

After we flew across the country we
got into bed, laid our bodies
delicately together, like maps laid
face to face, East to West, my
San Francisco against your New York, your
Fire Island against my Sonoma, my
New Orleans deep in your Texas, your Idaho
bright on my Great Lakes, my Kansas
burning against your Kansas your Kansas
burning against my Kansas, your Eastern
Standard Time pressing into my
Pacific Time, my Mountain Time
beating against your Central Time, your
sun rising swiftly from the right my
sun rising swiftly from the left your
moon rising slowly from the left my
moon rising slowly from the right until
all four bodies of the sky
burn above us, sealing us together,
all our cities twin cities,
all our states united, one
nation, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

Sharon Olds

Cover Art by Harland Ristau

This week's issue from the Lilliput archives is #65, from February 1995. To put things in gentle perspective, on February 23rd, 1995, the Dow Jones average closed at 4003.33, the first time it ever closed over 4000. Poetry, at that time, may also have been a tad more innocent, though I'm not sure if you can tell from the following. Enjoy.



------------------------------------------------------


Icarus

And I saw it through the barred
window, your hand with bits
of light in it. I licked them like a horse
and grew wings no sun can kill.

Ali Kress

------------------------------------------------------

Dialectician

The
entire
leaf
he
shoulders
has
roots
elsewhere

Gregory Vincent S. Thomasino

------------------------------------------------------



Paint Sadness

floating
down a
river

catching
on tree
roots

swirling.

Suzanne Bowers

------------------------------------------------------

Elegy

He would have to tell this one to Dad.
He started to pick up the phone
and dial the number,
smiling all the while.

Then he remembered.
When everyone asked him
who he was going to call
he was afraid to answer.

Daniel J. McCaffrey

------------------------------------------------------




Guardrail Graffiti (A Found Poem)

DICKNOSE
FUCK YOU
I LOVE DRUGS

Bart Solarcyzk

------------------------------------------------------

Bird Haiku #14

Wings extended across the ground
a dead sparrow
flies into eternity.

David Rhine

------------------------------------------------------



In memory of Suzanne Bowers and Harland Ristau.



best,
Don