Frank O'Hara Hit: Issa's Sunday Service, #166

   
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One of my favorite bands - strike that, one of the best alternative bands of the last 25 years, Sonic Youth is currently on what may prove to be permanent hiatus. It is often difficult to overcome the tribulations of love within a band, especially when it goes decidedly south. But, you never know.

I've great faith in Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore.

That being said, I discovered last week Moore has a new band - Chelsea Light Moving (tip of the hat to Philip Glass) - and they seriously rock and, in the case above, seriously litrock.  

"Frank O'Hara Hit" has got everything going for it in the art rock sense - already there are complaints that Chelsea sounds just like Sonic Youth. Yeah, well, complain away, great music is great music, so there you go.

And then there is: "Yes no, yes no, yes, yes", which you will hear at the very end of the cut, if you make it all the way through the glorious noodling (yes, I recognize this isn't everybody's cup of meat) . 

And, if not and you are still here (yes, I do love you), you can hear it in it's original context, if you prefer the lyrical to the sonic (pun intended): here is Frank O'Hara, reading his poem "September 14th, 1959 (Moon)."
 



September 14th 1959 (The Moon)

Serenity lopes along like exhaustion
only windier and silver-eyed
where fragments of distress in hunks
lay like the plaster in the bedroom
when the bed fell down, greenly
murmuring a phrase from the Jacksonville
Chamber of Commerce of the Pacific
yes no, yes no, yes, yes, yes

an agate breeze pours through the gate
of reddish hair there is a summer
of silence and inquiry waiting there
it is full of wildness and tension
like a gare, the warmly running trains
of the South escape to sweet brooks
and grassy roadbeds underneath the
thankful and enlightening Russian moon 


There's another song called "Burroughs" on the new album, which I have on order, and which no doubt will be making an appearance here sometime soon.

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Moon Gazing, Hokusai School 19th century

if only she were here
for me to nag...
tonight's moon!

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

best,

Don   

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Lillie poem archive

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Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 166 songs

C. P. Cavafy: State of the Art Website

Tomorrow is the anniversary of the birth of the great Greek poet, C. P. Cavafy. Two new volumes of his work have just been published: a new Collected Poems and a volume entitled The Unfinished Poems. Online the official Cavafy website is a state of the art wonder, collecting a variety of translations (sometimes up to 4 for an individual poem) into 5 distinct categories: "The Canon," "Repudiated," "Hidden," "Unfinished (titles only)," and "Prose Poems." There are also sections of his prose, as well as biographical, critical material, and a bibliography of his work. In addition there is an archival section that has notes, images, manuscripts, and more.

The respect accorded to the poet here should be a model for website development of all major poets, it is that good. All the major works, as translated by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard are available to read, with many alternate translations as alluded to above. As an example, here are two translations of a short poem of interest:

Long Ago

I’d like to speak of this memory...
but it’s so faded now... as though nothing is left—
because it was so long ago, in my early adolescent years.

A skin as though of jasmine...
that August evening—was it August?—
I can still just recall the eyes: blue, I think they were...
Ah yes, blue: a sapphire blue.

C. P. Cavafy
translated by Edmund Keeley/Philip Sherrard

Far Back

I should like to tell you of this reminiscence....
But it has faded so.... it is as though nothing now remained —
because far back, in my first adolescent years it lies.

A skin that was suggestive of the jasmine....
That August evening — Was it the month of August?....
Hardly do I remember now the eyes; they were blue, I think....
Ah, yes! I can recall their blue — a sapphire blue.

C. P. Cavafy
translated by John Cavafy

Placing a variety of translations of individual poems side by side like this helps greatly in attempting to evoke the poet's original execution and intent. Even the lesser translations provide a wealth of suggestion for healthy speculation. Another poem I was taken with, "Candles," has three variations as well as the original Greek. It just doesn't get much better than this. It's well worth checking out while Cavafy is in mind.

Tomorrow is also the birthday of Yusef Komunyakaa: here is nice selection of his work at the Internet Poetry Archive.

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Cover by Bobo

This visit to the Lilliput Review archive takes a look at issue #37 from October 1992. Issues #1 through the 30's were in the original Lillie format, approx. 3.6 x 4.25", as opposed to the layout it eventually morphed into, 4.25 x 3.5." Whats the diff, you might ask. Well, the current format has 16 pages, as opposed to 12 pages, and is taller than it is wide, the reverse of the original. Thus more pages and more poems per page. The old format averaged between 10 to 15 poems, the new 20 to 26 or so.

Just in case you were wondering.

As a result, from here out through issue #1, there are less poems to choose from so, as a result, there will probably be a few less sample poems per issue. Here are 3 from October 1992:

blackness
like a smile
engulfing a white bird
a single motion
gaining the swooping speeed
of a voice
stretching across the land,
a sheet of sound
that might blanket
the living birth
within your throat

Ben Tremillo

Second Chance

In your dream you return
to the place where you went
wrong, and given this chance
to change things you go on
the way you went before.
Even in sleep you know
there is only one go --
and it went well the first time.
Where it didn't -- well, it will
be good to see you again.

Louis McKee

Gone Forever

the sky, flat and infinite blue
with coos of a mourning dove
bouncing off its page

who would call you back
when even the smallest cries
are erased

Vogn

Finally, happy birthday to Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth:

the distant mountain
reflected in his eyes...
dragonfly

Issa
translated by David Lanoue

best,
Don