Thanks to Larry Robin and co.

Because Hal Sirowitz and I had another great event reading poems together (at Moonstone Arts Center, this time 11/09/10), I just wanted to say thanks to the best indie bookstore owner in Philly, Larry Robin, for supporting me and my work with his Moonstone series, and thanks to our host Ray Garmin, and thanks to Aaren Perry for helping Hal Sirowitz and I after the event to do a brief interview for public access TV. And thanks to the nice small audience in the space, and thanks to the many dozens who were streaming it online.

two prose poems

Nacho Nirvana

On my way home from the gym I see a sign by the pricey steak house on Broad St.—it says,

“Experience Nacho Nirvana. $6.”

I’ve been a short order cook before, and I can guess that this is probably a blend of several diabetes-inducing cheeses, grated and melted over corn-flower chips with salt and grease liberally processed in. You might as well spin the cheese in a centrifuge, separate out the fat molecules and inject them straight into your heart’s hardest arteries. Sure, it would be a shock, but think of the time you’d save in trying to kill yourself with self-indulgent grease-coated fat-laden death-flakes.

On the other hand, they’re only $6....


In Just Fifty Years

For no particular reason, Broad Street has a garish pink, violet and blue lights display beaming up the tall buildings’ facades in a sort of a synchronized disco ballroom rhythm, but slower, like the whole thoroughfare is on major tranquilizers. In the display case of Borders Books I see a cover photo of an ultra-macho guy, and the title is something like In Fifty Years We’ll All Be Chicks.

My earliest memory

My earliest memory

When my head was still bigger than both of my arms and I had to use all their strength to grab the crib bars to stand up in my crib, I looked out through the dark window pane while everyone was sleeping. Outside I saw bright red and white lights streaking beneath magically. The whole moon seemed magical, too. It was frightening sometimes how the lights would screech. They could stop or be so quick as they shined under the streetlights like the shiny backs of cockroaches under the glare of light bulbs in our home. The lights kept moving this way and that way every moment through all of the night I could remember, mysterious and beautiful.

They reminded me of my grandparents crossing the wooden floors downstairs, moving ahead slowly in the dim light from a farther room. They too seemed to see only straight ahead, almost traveling blindly, strange creatures in the night world.

{from a work in progress}


the thin blue thread of light


1. dysphoria after labor for eighteen hours

when the doctor pushed for surgery
—a C-section intervening
regardless of us as human beings
or our hope, our plan
for a natural birth—
there was the shock of falling
into that deepest gravity,
fear of all I could lose:
mother, infant,
and all the imagined future—

then there was anger at the doctor blackmailing us
with a release form
(releasing him from blame for deaths
if we waited too long)
paining her even more
at the eighteenth hour—

my anger grew acute in surgery
when the baby’s head was stuck,
seeing how hard he pulled the feet
of our infant’s body stretching so far
it must have hurt beyond
anything it ever felt before
—I wanted to pummel the surgeon,
but could only watch—

but then the surprise
was in the nurse’s hands
feeling the newborn
void, pee and cry
terrorized, it was clear,
in his first world-sized scare—
a folded football body,
sorrowful, slick, anguished
from the torture of being
yanked so hard
from the once-whole womb—

he cried in his first pain
as big as all the space his cry could fill,
but through his wrinkly skin,
he strangely linked
to my hands somehow calming
my small fretful son,
estranged from every
thing
except my voice
heard so often before he was born,
as if it registered,
he responded,
soothed,
like he knew his father.


and I wanted to live—against my will
because my son needed me to.

a thin blue thread of light through me
lifted my voice—I spoke to him

when I first held his infant self
crying in terror in the sterile OR

I wanted to live—against my will
because my son was born.



2. first impressions

Our son was only a few hours old.
The RN named Lisa was imprinting his feet
into little family photo albums,
and he was crying in fear and frustration
at having his feet moved against his will
over and over, again.
I explained to Lisa
these were gifts for his grandparents.
The baby cried even louder,
so I told him:
“If you think this is bad,
wait till you meet them in real life.”



3. the first night in the hospital

the instant he cried in the dark
I rose from the deep vinyl chair
without sleep,
without thinking—
hanging from a thin blue thread of light from the sky
holding up my head
walking me toward him
over linoleum
lit only by night-lights—
without effort at all
except a kind of submission
to the cry that rose
like another
thin blue thread of light
hanging from the sky

without knowing how I’d know
I lifted him, pacified,
changed and bundled him again—
then felt the ovular indentation encircling his head
—realized he’d been stuck so hard
his skull now had a dent-band—
cradling him on my forearm,
I paced so slowly
his breathing evened
in the near silence of the semi-dark,
and I set him down, deep in sleep.

Sinking into the stiff stuffed chair again,
I was so happy because of him
a smile lifted
every depleted cell in me,
and I was happy because of this
thin blue thread of light
(was it from the sky, or was it from us?)
that interlinks us
and out of pain brings joy.

kitsch, hallmarkiness, corpocration, and the official truth

If you care about the truth, especially in the arts, then you have to care about all of its second string replacement players. Kitsch, "hallmarkiness," "corpocration," and "official truth" are all varieties of bullshit that we ingest continually from all types of media and directly from each other.

Kitsch is defined by the dictionary as sentimental and vulgar, especially in the arts. But a great writer defined it more intuitively and usefully as a world envisioned as if there were no shit in it anywhere.

"Hallmarkiness" is a subcategory of kitsch and derives from Hallmark cards. "Hallmarkiness" seems more limited to scenes designed to elicit warmth in programmatic ways such as cute kids doing cute silly things at the family dinner table, children eagerly awaiting Santa Claus near a hearth hung with stockings etc.

"Corpocration" is what is spoken in a corpocracy, which is "A company characterized by top-heavy, isolated, risk-averse management, excess paperwork, low productivity, poor interdepartmental communication, and lack of imagination, especially in product development and marketing" (American Heritage Dictionary). Who speaks corpocration? Almost anyone who has ever had to give a presentation in an office setting in a corpocracy has had to learn at least basic corpocration. What's wrong with corpocration is that it feels and sounds very scripted by external corporate interests all the time. It's inhuman.

Celebrities and politicians are normally forced to say by their sponsors and donors a lot of corpocration in speeches. When they go off script and sound like people and accidentally say what they really think, it is often called a gaffe.

The "official truth" is the version of the truth that the powers that be will tolerate, and departures from this will be penalized. However, there are different sources of power in a society such as the United States of America, so the "official truth" can be claimed by multiple agencies or entities such as corporations, the federal, state or local governments, spiritual or religious organizations, professional organizations or associations etc. The one thing that all of these varieties of "official truth" have in common is intolerance for other forms of truth. Sometimes this intolerance manifests in aggression, attacks and even hate speech or propaganda. The "offical truth" is the one thing you can always count on to be wrong, at least in some fundamental way.

When you are writing, it is always helpful to remember the ways that writers go wrong. However, most writers do not go far into the fields of bullshit. The most common way any of the above will manifest is in the form of a cliche, a bit of received knowledge that seems untested or unearned.

It is sadly far more likely that when writers fail to say anything true it is because they are not saying anything that has any bearing on anything at all. Somehow they missed the lesson about the classics that said they speak to the serious problems that people face every moment of their lives.

Sean Thomas Dougherty at Drexel University Oct. 21, 2009

On Wednesday the 21st of October at Drexel University in the Bossone auditorium, for the first time I saw Sean Thomas Dougherty give a poetry reading. I’d heard that he was great from many people, but seeing him in real life really made a profound difference. Since he has videos available through BOA editions, which published Broken Halleleujahs, I won’t even try to describe the indescribable.

The audience, including mostly students— there may have been 70-80 there plus a half dozen faculty—was deeply moved. Students who are told to go to things are generally a tough crowd, but he really won them over.

What was almost as interesting as the reading itself was the Q&A afterwards. Students asked about many themes, including his spirituality, his influences, etc. He gave a long list of greats in his influences. But he also made a point of saying that the most important influence was Patrick Lawler. Yes, that Patrick Lawler published by MMM Press as well as some other fine presses.

Thanks to Harriet Levin and others at Drexel University for helping to make this possible!

MMM at Big Blue Marble Books near c c Philly

On Sunday October 18th MMM had a reading at Big Blue Marble Bookstore, which is half an hour from center city Philadelphia. Surprisingly, we had a standing room only crowd overflowing around us and around the floor (sitting on cushions when chairs ran out), and they were standing almost all the way out the back door etc. It was a tiny room that holds maybe fifteen people comfortably, but there were perhaps 25-30 people trying to be there. It was a very diverse and interesting lineup: Minter Krotzer, Barb Daniels, me, Dave Moolten & Hal Sirowitz.

Minter read very, very briefly, being the MC/host. Barb did a great job. I read just 2 poems when I realized there were 7-8 small kids in the audience. So i couldn't read 98% of my material. but i did give a very brief history of mmm from the beginnings in CO with Naomi and its near-death and resurrection out of ashes etc. Dave Moolten did a very solid reading. Hal especially gave a terrific reading. He was very funny and warm.


People were very happy afterwards. A bunch of friendly people bought books from me, which was another surprise because I read less than anyone else. Sales were actually good (surprise), & a few MMM Vol IX issues sold.

I did give away about two dozen back issues to people who came to the reading. Perhaps that helped put the audience in a good mood.