Thursday, July 24, 2008

hours of interest here

I can't believe how wonderful of a resource this will be. I also can't imagine how much time I will be spending here.

http://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/authors.php

Listen to your favorite poets read their work for hours on end!



Including this guy, mother fucking Jack Spicer.

Marvelous.

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

"Surround yourself with people who are so good they scare you."

II by Ted Berrigan

Dear Margie, hello. It is 5:15 a.m

dear Berrigan. He died
Back to books. I read
It's 8:30 p.m. in New York and I've been running around all day
old come-all-ye's streel into the streets. Yes, it is now,
How Much Longer Shall I Be Able To Inhabit the Divine
and the day a bright gray turning green
feminine marvelous and tough
watching the sun come up over the Navy Yard
to write scotch-tape body in a notebook
had 17 and 1/2 milligrams
Dear Margie, hello. It is 5:15 a.m.
fucked til 7 now she's late to work and I'm
18 so why are my hands shaking I should know better


I'd like to be more communicative with my writing friends or I'd like to establish a better working relationship with them. My process is that of a maverick as opposed to a shooting guard. I love my friends' writing. I think a lot of it is really great. There is something wonderful about being pushed by the successes of others. It's competition to a certain degree and I think we'd all be better off for it should we call it what it is. I want to be better than all of my writing friends at writing, but know that would be impossible because of their talents along with my envy and self doubt. But what would better be? We are all good and could be great if we push things the way they need to be pushed. Tact and compassion are necessary but I want to be kicked into the street sometimes. I want to pick up the pieces of my poems with a pen and recast them in a way that make my friends smile and want to be better themselves because of it. I'd like to re-establish writer's group but focus it more. Maybe focus is the wrong word. I'd like to get together with the writers I love and hash out freely and laugh and laugh and laugh.

Monday, July 21, 2008

affix these words to your paper, pen

Collaborative poetry writing is quite the mind explosion.

More to follow soon.

I'm feeling great.

And Dan, I am Kyle.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

we're wearing those hats for a reason, son

I am socially exhausted and am tired of the production that goes in to all the madness of "chillin'." When I was growing up, if someone called you and you didn't answer or weren't there, it was because you weren't there or were unavailable. I would like to be unavailable for awhile is what I'm saying. Maybe not to you (whoever) but to everyone else. I'm not sad. I'm not upset. I'm actually quite happy. If I want to see you, you'll see me if the feelings are mutual at your end. I'll be burying my phone soon.

You can correspond with me through the U.S. Postal Service. My address is:

1445 E St.
Lincoln, NE 68508

k

Monday, July 14, 2008

there's a river in there

Hello.

The man who currently sits to the right of my desk, I was told, has a mild case of Tourette's. The other day he yelled out, "Fuck-a-fart!" This has obvious entertainment value (especially on days where I have nothing to do). Lately, I have been standing up on my chair to spy on him over my cubicle wall. He is usually talking on his telephone saying a variety of humorous, often insightful things. In mid conversation with someone on the phone, he exclaimed (while jumping to his feet) "I'm gonna pack his shit like it's never been packed before!" Immediately after he said this, he looked up and made eye contact with me and instantly saluted me, as if to tell me he knows he's a wild man and knows I am too. We have a connection, he and I, for the same reason people rarely keep their offices next to his, for the same reason I am described to people who don't know me as, "The tall one who shouts."

Heraclitus said, "You cannot step twice into the same stream. For as you are stepping in, other waters are ever flowing on to you." This reminds me of watching movies and having conversations and writing blogs. No big revelation here, it's just something I think about every now and then. I want to be as supportive of the people I care about as I can and believe I do a good job of it for the most part. Sometimes re-reading old things you've written or old things written you've received brings you back to where you always wanted to be but didn't realize you were there while it was happening. I feel so tired and sorry about all of the things I've never done and will likely never do.

I'm excited for what might happen to me and my life, but understand and accept the things that will not, even if it was something I expected or hoped for. I bought a drawing by Jake Gillespie this weekend. I need to go to Hobby Lobby for a frame soon.

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

something IS and some things ARE

Water Music
by Robert Creeley

The words are a beautiful music.
The words bounce like in water.

Water music,
loud in the clearing

off the boats,
birds, leaves.

They look for a place
to sit and eat--

no meaning,
no point.


step into my office...because you're fucking fired

At work I have to wear a name badge thinger around my neck which gains me access to certain areas of the building which would otherwise be unavailable to me. Yesterday I forgot said badge and had to borrow a co-worker's in order to get back into my office after going to the bathroom. When I returned he was nowhere to be found. It turns out he was fired while I taking care of my business. I just figured he went home early. Another person was also fired yesterday. I saw this firing, the aftermath at least. I saw her clear out her personal belongings and be escorted out of the building. gggggllllllll.

I was sitting on a couch last night looking at a copy of Joyce's Dubliners that was sitting on a coffee table when a girl cried out, "Whose book is that?" One thing led to another and she closed the conversation with "I read it for a class, it's alright." ... Can James Joyce be considered "alright?" And even if he can, who then would be considered higher than "alright" on that continuum? Woolf? Twain? Who knows, it doesn't really matter, however. How anyone can read "The Dead" within Dubliners and still describe the book as "alright" needs to reevaluate their critical analysis in my mind. RE READ THAT STORY.

He implores you.
I've got no personal items here that I can't live without, by the way. Bring on the pain, mother fuckers.

Thursday, July 3, 2008

i'm a prince somewhere to someone

I have absolutely nothing to do at work today. I will be sitting in front of this computer doing nothing at work today. I have nothing to do.

So I moved into a new house two days ago. The house is a mansion and I have a fireplace in my room. Reportedly, we're having a 4th of July party on the 4th of July. Come see my house. My brain feels like it's been hacked up into fragments. I'm thinking in fragments. I feel as though every sentence I write is a small fragment of my brain (which of course is always true). These really are horrible sentences.

I read two poems last week. I think they went over pretty well, but who knows. Z told me that he thought I got a good response from the crowd, "you got some laughs," he said. I can never tell if when people laugh they are actually laughing at what I'm reading or if they are laughing at my manner of speaking. I don't really think of my poetry as funny, necessarily, but it rarely broods. I get too excited when I write to write a sad poem. This is likely influenced, like many other aspects of my writing, by Koch and others. Koch is kind of seen as a comedic writer, but in response to this he claims,

"I don’t think the nature of my poetry is satirical or even ironic, I think its essentially lyrical...The comic element is just something that it seems to me enables me to be lyrical in the same way."

I think that's a good way to understand a writing style that focuses on an everydayness instead of a formal poetic approach (which means what exactly?). When we speak to each other, when we have conversations, consider when these instances are beautiful and exciting. Spontaneity results in happiness in language. I laugh at something that rises up from nowhere into a conversation not necessarily because it is funny per se, but rather because it is surprising and refreshing and comfortably uncomfortable. I keep saying that I'll post a poem, but I'm at work right now so I can't (I'm no slam, man). I will eventually.

I really think that I'm beginning to get over pessimism. I have a lot of cynical friends and sometimes it's just tiring to be around. Live and let live and love, mother fuckers. Stop blaming everyone else for your unhappiness and raise up people. Sorry, I'm not better than anyone else. There will be no more of that.

I wish I would have brought my ipod to work. I want to listen to Bonnie "Prince" Billy more. I love him too.