What Keeps Mankind Alive: Issa's Sunday Service, #32

This week's Issa's Sunday Service features two repeat offenders: Tom Waits (as musician) performing the work of Bertolt Brecht (as inspiration), in this case "What Keeps Mankind Alive," a devastating little ditty if ever there was one. Monday, December 7th is the birthday of Mr. Waits, hence this week's selection. The song comes from The Threepenny Opera, with lyrics by Brecht and music by Kurt Weill. Here's the words:

What Keeps Mankind Alive

You gentlemen who think you have a mission
To purge us of the seven deadly sins
Should first sort out the basic food position
Then start your preaching, that’s where it begins

You lot who preach restraint and watch your waist as well
Should learn, for once, the way the world is run
However much you twist or whatever lies that you tell
Food is the first thing, morals follow on

So first make sure that those who are now starving
Get proper helpings when we all start carving
What keeps mankind alive?

What keeps mankind alive?
The fact that millions are daily tortured
Stifled, punished, silenced and oppressed
Mankind can keep alive thanks to its brilliance
In keeping its humanity repressed
And for once you must try not to shriek the facts
Mankind is kept alive by bestial acts

Happy birthday, Mr. Waits. And, as a little present, here is ol' Uncle Bill, of Naked Lunch fame, to give his rendition of same:

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This week's feature poem comes from issue #48, a broadside entitled Tibetan Gun Flower by the poet Charlie Mehrhoff. Back in August, I read one of the poems from this broadside, "springtime in a city park,"(page down a bit to see) at the Six Gallery Press reading. Recently, I posted another, entitled "fact:", at the daily Twitter feed (which cross-posts to Facebook). For those of you who don't lean in those directions, here it is:

fact:

to think that god had to become me
in order to throw his cigarette out the window,
write these words.

Charlie Mehrhoff

And here's another from that same broadside, previously unposted:

leaf, green leaf
her shadow
upon the silence of an empty road
that is poetry.

Charlie Mehrhoff

And, of course, the last word goes to the master:

a wood fire--
her shadow in the window
pulling thread

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don

Wednesday Haiku, Week #1: Charlie Mehrhoff

 Wednesday Haiku, Week #1

The door to the forest slams shut,
wild man
coming home.

Charlie Mehrhoff

 




 Send a single poem for Wednesday Haiku @ Issa's Untidy Hut to:

wednesday haiku AT gmail DOT com

the woods are dark
but out and about...
the year's first crow

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don

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Bob Carlton & Charlie Mehrhoff: Wednesday Haiku, #128

 Photo by yellow bird woodstock

 

fire
 
....

fly

Bob Carlton

 

Photo by NASA/SDO

the fireflies
here and there
an echo
of the sun

Charlie Mehrhoff

Photo by OuchCharlie

flitting firefly--
uncaught by the hand
uncaught again!

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don   

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Charlie Mehrhoff & Rehn Kovacic: Wednesday Haiku, #118

 Photo by Ajnagraphy

freezing rain
born again
in the headlights

Charlie Mehrhoff

 Photo by Average Jane Crafter

My poetry—
    each word
  stolen from the moon.

    Rehn Kovacic

Photo by Kevin Ambrose (Washington Post)

big rain
big moon
cicada in the pine

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don   

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Charlie Mehrhoff: Monday Twitter Poem

Going nowhere.

Always packed and ready.

   Charlie Mehrhoff  in Lilliput Review #171

nowhere, nowhere
can a young scarecrow
be found

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don

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Spell (Footnote to Howl): Issa's Sunday Service, #36

This week was the birthday of one of the premiere rock poets of all time, Patti Smith. In celebration (and to shelve all those Lawrence Welk and doo-wop shows for at least a week), public TV has been airing the documentary film Patti Smith: Dream of Life on POV. Appropriately, this week's litrock selection at Issa's Sunday Service is her rendition of the final part (or addendum, for purists) of Allen Ginsberg's masterpiece, Howl: that section, entitled "Footnote to Howl," Smith recorded as "Spell: (Footnote to Howl)."

Happy birthday, Patti. The two shows I had the privilege to attend here in Pittsburgh that she gave were two of the best rock shows I've ever seen and I've been going to concerts since 1968. The outdoor show with just a couple of hundred people in a light, cold rain was every bit as intense as the one she gave for a couple of thousand. Her connection to the audience is remarkable.

As a footnote to Howl and Footnote to Howl, here is a 2 part video made by Karen Lillis as part of her internship at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. In it, she highlights all the resources on the poem Howl and Allen Ginsberg at the library. In addition, she interviewed three folks at the library intimately engaged in poetry as to what the poem means to them: Barry Chad, Renée Alberts, and myself. The video is static, the information dynamic. If you have interest in the poem and/or Ginsberg, I think you'll enjoy it.









************************************************


Public television is also going to be airing, at least in Minnesota, a show entitled The Poetry and Life of Cold Mountain, about the master Chinese poet, Han Shan. You can read more about it here.

There is small animated segment in the show. Perhaps these wonderful poems, whimsically rendered, will entice you to watch:






************************************************


Finally, a poem from Lilliput #56, April 1994, six poems of which were featured in a previous post. This little gem, by Charlie Mehrhoff, gives "flash fiction" a run for its money:

¶ nothing heals.

the doctor bends low
to kiss a whisper into the corpse's ear:
it was i who needed you
it was i who needed you

Charlie Mehrhoff

playing doctor
for the silkworms...
little girl

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don

Issa's Birthday Song

Well, David Giacalone and Rebecca Bush sent along notes to remind me that Monday, June 15th, is the day Issa's Birthday is celebrated so I can't let that pass unnoticed.

at my dinner tray
a sparrow chirps...
spring rain

paying no heed
to Buddha's birthday...
wildflowers

deutzia blossoms, too
on Buddha's birthday
report for duty

Issa
translations by David Lanoue

Whenever I think of Issa, inevitably my thoughts move to sparrows, a bird that he just adored and I have to say his is an admiration I share. The house sparrows in our maple tree in the back yard have been raising holy hell of late and I just love it. We planted the tree not long after moving into the house 10 years or so ago and now I realize how very easy it is, indeed, to change the world.

This is Issa's birthday song ...

A few days ago, I was trying to help someone find a poem s/he couldn't remember the author or title of, all s/he could remember was some sensory impressions and that it was either by William Carlos Williams or Richard Brautigan (specifically The Pill Versus the Springhill Mining Disaster). Here's her/his description:

the only thing I remember is that it may have had something to do with a storm or disaster, and it tasted red and ashy. It was rather short as well and the final line was rather final.

Also, s/he remembered that it had been on the left hand page side. I felt from the last line that it was more likely to be Brautigan than Williams, so I went off to look through the Brautigan. I skimmed through the left sided poems but nothing. Than I realized that s/he had read it in one of those Brautigan omnibus editions and I thought the pagination might be different, so I skimmed the right sided poems. Nothing.

Well, not really nothing, because, though I didn't find the poem, I got totally rejazzed on Mr. B. I had reread The Pill last year and though I'd enjoyed it, it hadn't quite been the overwhelming experience I expected. Seems I must have been in some kind of funky snit because this time round I was delighted, cajoled, appalled, and all choked up in a fine mix of emotional falderol.

He had me at one, as the au currant saying goes.

Here's one by Mr. B. that grabbed me and that you don't see all over the net everyday:

To England

There are no postage stamps that send letters
back to England three centuries ago,
no postage stamps that make letters
travel back until the grave hasn't been dug yet,
and John Donne stands looking out the window,
it is just beginning to rain this April morning,
and the birds are falling into the trees
like chess pieces into an unplayed game,
and John Donne sees the postman coming up the street,
the postman walks very carefully because his cane
is made of glass.

Richard Brautigan

For those who might be interested, here's a link to a post I did for the library about how I became a reader. It explains a couple of my, er, eccentricities.

Lilliput Review #24, today's selection from the archives, comes from the distant land of September 1991, and is a broadside issue by one of today's best small press poets, Charlie Mehrhoff. He brings it big-time in a way today's household names rarely even dream of. Here's a taste:

with the dawn of fire

with the music
of the stone hammer

with the birth
of the ancient drum
hear now
hear now

creation

prophet of the godless landscape

he sends his voice
into the cold stones
at the river's bottom
there to awaken
in the springtime
pieces
of broken ice

The Raven

said to her
are you into scarification
baby

will you wear the leather mask
will you make me forget
the day of my birth
the eyes of the idol
the child of god
of rain

the impact of the poet:

one soul falling
backward

& she wants the whole world
delivered in a second

simple.
i give her bells,
tell her to wait.

Charlie Mehrhoff

the Buddha pretends
to be born...
bells and drums

Issa
translated by David Lanoue

One final note: did you Stravinsky today? I did.



best,
Don

alter-world: old pajamas

What is it we ask of the modern short-form poet, the modern haiku poet? What do we want, what is necessary in a short poem?

What do we need?

To get close to an answer to any, or all, of these questions perhaps we should be asking most importantly: what do we ask of ourselves when it comes to poetry as readers and, for some, as poets?

Old Pajamas (aka Alan Segal) is an excellent poet working in short forms for whom form itself is mercurial, form is protean, form is content's shadow. Like contemporary masters Cid Corman, John Martone, and Charlie Mehrhoff, he knows where the lines are and chooses to dance over and amongst them.

For my two cents, Old Pajamas would be a candidate for inclusion in a second edition of Haiku in English, as would Ed Baker, another fine purveyor of 'shorties' as he is wont to call them on any given day, work don't fit any strict definition but is all heart and spirit and soul.

Is the pen name 'Old Pajamas' off-putting? Just think about the various pen-names of so many Japanese poets. Even the masters - Bashō's name means banana leaf or tree, Issa's cup-of-tea, Buson's midnight studio, and Shiki's cuckoo. 

As far as English goes, Old Pajamas sounds just fine to me. 

The new collection he sent along is a limited hardcover edition, 1 of 25 printed.The book is entitled alter-world and here are four of my favorites from it:

Photo by Hadi Fooladi

ah
the butterfly
not an actor

Photo by Amour Perdu

that you're in black
flower and scaly
while I'm paleness
blinking in the dark
is enough enough for us

Photo by flugflugfunmangel

in one cricket
the sound is weary

Photo by Seth Anderson

BLOWER MOTOR #4

mad with rust  / /  camellias in bloom




Regular readers of this blog will recognize this last poem (and photo) as having appeared previously on Wednesday Haiku. 

Looking at these four pieces superficially they seem to be all over the place, form-wise. Yet, there is a unifying element among them, one of the major components of traditional haiku.

All four are firmly ground in nature.

Now, arguments could certainly be had, one way or the other, as to which, if any, are haiku, and which are not. I have my opinions and I'll keep them (mostly) to myself. 

One thing I will say is that they are all haiku-like or, even more generally, fine brief poems.   

alter-world is not available to purchase, so there is no pitch here. However, you can find more of Alan's work, from alter-world and and other places, at old pajamas: from the dirt hut. It is definitely worth your while. There is also a more extensive review of an earlier collection, Drenched Through at Old Age, here.


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

Photo by Mo

when will it become
a cricket's nest?
my white hair

Issa
trans. by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don

PS  Click to learn how to contribute to Wednesday Haiku

Sharkey's Night: Issa's Sunday Service, #54

Laurie Anderson & Husband

Saturday June 5th was the birthday of avant-garde performance artist Laurie Anderson. There is a lot by Anderson that might find its way onto Issa's Sunday Service, but I've always been particularly fond of this little number, which was one of Mr. Burroughs's, Mr. William Burroughs that is, first forays into "mass media."

Paging Mr. Sharkey, white courtesy telephone please ...

And here is a special little treat:

As good as that performance is, it just is missing something without the big guy's voice. See here is another little oddity by Big Bill, called "Ah Pook."

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


This week's poem comes from the broadside spectacles of poverty, by scarecrow (Charlie Mehrhoff), published as Lilliput Review, #80, in June 1996. Additional poems from this broadside may be found in this earlier post.

words
each word a letter,
a mirror
held up to the soul.

or better: writing is the scratching
of ancient dust from mirrors.

(even the words of others
(sometimes
(part of your face.

scarecrow

Mister Monkey too
wears a funny face...
plum blossoms

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don

Japanese Love Poems & New Issues

The contributor copies of the new issues of Lilliput Review went out in the mail this past Monday and regular subscriber copies will begin hitting the mails over the next two weeks. It usually takes about a full month to get out the entire run, what with letters to be written, poems to be read and all the attendant details in getting scores of envelopes out each week.





#161 is graced with the photographs of Keddy Ann Outlaw, dedicated to the memory of her brother, Wade Stanton Outlaw. Among others, poems appear by John Martone, W. T. Ranney, Peggy Heinrich, Donny Smith, Charlie Mehrhoff, George Swede and translations of the Japanese tanka great, Yosano Akiko, by Dennis Maloney, 25 poems in all. 25 poems for a buck: you do the math.






#162 is a broadside issue by David Chorlton, who has been appearing in Lillie since its inception, way back in 1989. David is a consummate artist; this issue, entitled Venetian Sequence, showcases his beautifully lyrical poetry and his own artwork, as seen above. Here's a poetic taste:


Paganini

His audience applauds,
convinced he is the devil
who never sleeps.
After the performance
he sails to the dead.
Their breath steams out of frozen marble
when he plays. They whisper
each one to the next, that the time has come
to grow back their flesh
and complete abandoned vices.




Cover by Edward O'Durr Supranowicz

Spotlighted this week is LR #148, published in February 2006. The issue opens with 5 poems by a variety of poets with the common thread of our place in nature: they are deceptively simple. It is a fine coming together of work by 5 grounded poets; it was a privilege to publish. Issa would be proud.



Stopping as a crow
alights in a snowed pine copse
-the poem composed

Rebecca Lily

yesterday's snow---
the place it melts
to

Gary Hotham

this spring
the birds are nesting
where his garden was

Joyce Austin Gilbert

Monet
in his private garden
and vice versa

Pete Lee

Suddenly

spring
like

and
so

are
we

Bob Arnold

Besides these 5, there are 24 more poems in #148, many like-minded, all worth a look. As with regular issues, back issues from #1 through #160 are available for a buck apiece or a SASE (self-addressed stamped envelope). If the price is still too dear (and who's to say) more free samples may be found in the past posts of this blog or in the back issue archive at the Lilliput homepage.

Finally, there is that matter of Unending Night, as pictured at the top of this post. Unending Night is a selection of Japanese love poems drawn from the classic Japanese tanka anthology, The Hyakunin Isshu or 100 Poems by 100 Poets. The Hyakunin Isshu was compiled in the thirteenth century by Fujiwara no Teika and is the most popular of the classic poetry anthologies of Japan.

This selection from 100 Poems ... is translated by Dennis Maloney and Hide Oshiro and is #18 in the Modest Proposal Chapbook series published by Lilliput Review. The chapbook features the poetry of 18 different classic Japanese poets and provides a unique lens through which to view this much loved anthology. The finishing touches are being put on Unending Night even as I type (i.e. it's being printed) and will be available by the end of the week. Price, as always for chapbooks, is $3.00, postpaid.

best till next week,
Don

Lilliput Review Back Issue: Homage

Cover by Guy R. Being

Today's featured back issue of Lilliput Review is #42, from March 1993. It was a rare theme issue: homage was that theme and, interestingly if my memory serves me well (it was 16 years ago), it was not an announced theme. It just came together that way. Enjoy.

Satie Revisited #14

if all goes
well
no one may be well ;
the worse,
the better, and if you see
any moment of light
it's like finding
moonlight
in your midnight sherry

Harland Ristau

Rimbaud

some one legged man
chained against the furnace wall
screaming:

hell has no power over pagans

charlie mehrhoff

Ode to T. S. Eliot

I can see clearly now
the need to be cheerful
anyway

Carl Mayfield

Salvador Dali

I can imagine myself
Slumped over a counter
In a downtown diner,
But not in a Salvador Dali

T. N. Turner

Jesus Christ

w/ a good roof,
everything else
is rain rolling

Eric Williamson

And the quote that started the whole issue off:

"If Al Green had one tit, I'd marry the motherfucker." Miles Davis

Richard Houff's poem above is simultaneously a concrete poem and a found poem; his young son had done the image and he added the title. Without Miles Davis, or Al Green for that matter, there never would have been a world worth living in.

I still miss Harland Ristau, very much. This one's for you, bud.

in honor of the equinox
the hedge
turns green

Issa
translated by David Lanoue

best,
Don

Issa's Sunday Service, #11: Bertolt Brecht & Jim Morrison

It is just incredible to think that Jim Morrison died on July 3, 1971, 38 years ago at the age of 27. Though this is the first appearance of The Doors at Issa's Sunday Service, it certainly won't be the last, because The Doors were the consummate LitRock band; unlike some, the balance between the rock and lit was never skewed in either direction. Nor will this be the last time that the work of Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill will be featured, a pair of favorites among art rock bands. Of course, The Doors could bring the grit and did; "Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar)," like many a Brecht composition, actually has some of its darker undercurrents toned down in execution. Still, a classic, if ever there was one. Enjoy.

This week's feature poem comes from Lilliput Review#20, March 1990. Here's looking at ya ...

don't blame the Third World
for pissing on your grave.
you've got no rhyme
left
in your body.

Charlie Mehrhoff

the smell of piss
wafting too...
chrysanthemums

Issa
translated by David Lanoue

best,
Don


Click LitRock @ from Issa's Sunday Service for full list of songs and postings.

Wendell Berry, Madam Marie, and the Summarize Monsieur Proust in Two Words (Or Less) Contest

Cover art by Oberc

A couple of interesting tidbits, if not poetic than certainly lyrical. First a very powerful interview with Wendell Berry in The Sun should be required reading for everyone. It's long and it's worth it. Second, sad news in the cultural icon department, as reported by the Asbury Park Press: Madam Marie has passed away at the age of 93. Here's a note by Bruce from his homepage:

Back in the day when I was a fixture on the Asbury Park boardwalk, I'd often stop and talk to Madam Marie as she sat on her folding chair outside the Temple of Knowledge.

I'd sit across from her on the metal guard rail bordering the beach, and watched as she led the day trippers into the small back room where she would unlock a few of the mysteries of their future. She always told me mine looked pretty good - she was right. The world has lost enough mystery as it is - we need our fortunetellers. We send our condolences out to her family who've carried on her tradition. Over here on E Street, we will miss her.

--Bruce Springsteen

As someone who did plenty of time in Asbury Park and saw many a so-called renaissance of the town come and go, the death of Madam Marie, her passing, resonants in many ways.

Today is the birthday of someone who, after many years, has become my favorite writer: Marcel Proust. In homage to Monty Python's The All-England Summarize Proust Competition, the website TEMPSPERDU.COM has a webpage of two, three, four, five etc. word summaries of Proust (all 3,000 plus pages) submitted by visitors to their site. Cliff's Notes could learn a thing or two about summarizing from these folks. I particularly love the two word summaries and can't decide which is my favorite: "Goodnight Mama", "Mmmm ... cookies", "Society sucks", or "Time flies."

Contributor copies of the new issues of Lilliput Review, #'s 163 and 164, went out this week. I will begin working on the subscription run this weekend. Typically, with poetry to read and letters to write, it takes me 6 or so weeks to get the full run out. Such is the life of a small press editor. #163 features poems by:

Yosano Akiko (Dennis Maloney translations), John Martone, Marcia Arrieta, Ed Baker, Hosho McCreesh, Bart Solarczyk, Paul Hostovsky, Kevin Richard Jones, Constance Campbell, Greg Watson, George Gott, Jeffrey Skeate, Alan Holder, Kelley Jean White, Mary Rooney, Lâle Müldür (translated by Donny Smith), Mike Dillon, Joseph Farley, Shey Galib (translated by Donny Smith), and Diane di Prima. Artwork is by John Harter, Edward O'Durr Supranowicz, and Guy Beining.

If anyone has contact info on Edward O'Durr Supranowicz, I could use it to get him his contributor copies. I don't have an address for him.

In #164, poems are by: Diane di Prima, John Martone, Greg Watson, Charlie Mehrhoff, Janet Baker, Paul Hostovsky, LeRoy Gorman, Hosho McCreesh, David Gross, Charles Nevsimal, Hugh Hennedy, Kelley Jean White, Ruben T. Abeyta, Wayne Hogan (also responsible for the artwork), M. Kei, David Lindley, Judy Swann, Mark J. Mitchell, Jacquelyn Bowen Aly, M. Kettner, Marcelle H. Kasprowicz, David Chorlton, Jessica Harman, Bart Galle, and Michael Wurster.

This week's back issue feature from the Lillie archive is #81 from August 1996 (who remembers that a former NFL quarterback was nominated by the Republicans for vice-president?). Here are a couple of samples:

Love in the Warm Sweet Air of Springtime

Sheets loosen
fall to the floor
the lamps tip
magazines slip
everything is touched
everything is moved.

Janell Moon

oh touch me you fool

and for all he's worth
his fingers fall like
pale leaves into the
wet autumn of spring

Angel D. Zapata

typical male

here I am
getting that
hackneyed
dog shit
creeping out
from under the snow
poem
out of my system

Matt Welter

And, you know, sometimes there is the beauty of serendipity or, as Jung would have it, synchronicity. I literally came across the following two poems in this issue after I'd written the above. The first is a nod to the Madam, RIP, the second needs no explanation beyond the fact that it was a "Brobdingnag Feature Poem," an occasional feature wherein the poet is permitted to go beyond the usual 10 line limit. Enjoy.

Columbus Avenue

Sidewalk slick with rain,
the fortune teller's daughter
sits barefoot in a doorway,
her painted toes curl in moist air.
The florist flirts, sells me white flowers,
casablanca lilies, he likes saying.
A street singer cries through this thick air,
he beats good rhythm on his thighs
and I give him money, of course I do.

Lonnie Hull Dupont

Proust

He wrote and
rewrote the
last of Remembrance
in bed, taped
changes on
to changes, some
paper accordion
folded out
across the
room with penned
corrections.
He died days later,
the manuscripts
still near the
bed like a
ticking watch on
the wrist of
a dead soldier.

Lyn Lifshin

Oh, I can't end that way, that's too many lines:

the fate of the tang dynasty

ink died
sparrow lives

W. B. Keckler

That's better.

best,
Don

Note: If you would like to receive the two current issues of Lilliput 
Review free (or haveyour current subscription extended two issues),
just make a suggestion of a title or titles for the Near Perfect Books 
of Poetry page, either in a comment to this post, in email to lilliput
review at gmail dot com, or in snail mail to the address on the
homepage.

Ed Baker on Albert Huffstickler

Please click art to enlarge

In response to last week's posting on Albert Huffstickler, poet/artist Ed Baker sent along a rendition of one of Huff's "Cafe Poems," with a haiga-like presentation. In the interest of truth or history or some such cultural folderol, Ed sent along an original drawing from 2003, entitled "Sophie's Song #123"; he added Huff's poem, a black dress, lipstick, and a discerning eye, resulting in the above rendition. Below is the original.

Sophie's Song #123

It's not often you come along a true original. Huff, certainly, is one of a kind. Ed is also as unique as they come. John Martone, Cid Corman, Diane Di Prima, Charlie Mehrhoff, Miriam Sagan ... these are just a few poets I've had the privilege to work with whose work is beyond comparison.

This go round, my appreciation to Ed, whose forthcoming broadside will be one of the 4 new issues of Lilliput Review that will start rolling out early in June. Stay tuned.

Here's another poem from the informal Cafe series Huff was always working on. It was first published in the one and only "long line" edition of Lillie (#32, June 1992) - yes, sometimes the length of lines is as problematic as the number in this tiny little mag. Enjoy.

Cafe Poem

That little old lady has a purpose.
She's a cartographer completing the map of her life.
It's there on her face,
as contained, as exact as the will that lies
deep in that small, shrunken breast.
She looks around her, laughs.
Another line forms,
another move toward the completion she already envisions.
There's nothing more for us here.
Let's leave her to her work.

Albert Huffstickler

to the old woman
doing laundry, the evening
willow bows

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,
Don