Robert J. Baumann

At the local indie bookstore with others...but Robert rocked by taking the time to actually TALK about method, investigation, process, and did it by really funny and witty. That is talking about his, ah...grid poems which he read. What luck to hear someone talk, not introduce or not not introduce (mumble: "I don wanna say anthing abut this poem...that would spoilt it.") or the intro that makes you rush the door (poetic voice: "My fathr died 25 years ago this week and I was walking down Main St and saw a shadow from a parking meter...and I just walked into Latte Land, slamed in my thumb drive and wrote this sonnet and then 150 more!!!"

And he also mentioned some forthcomming from his chapbook company. That is good news.

Okay....anytime anyone wants to have a poetry talking instead of a poetry reading....let me know. I am there.

Rugh Stuff arrived

Steve Till's new book Rugh Stuff arrived. (79 pages...humm....where'd ya shoot that, dude)Brilliant! Absolutely the funnest. Among other things Till's, to me, is one of very, very few writers who can create and present a conversation between characters (in this case on the golf course) and not make it seem idiotic. Go to http://theenk.blogspot.com.

I've had the pleasure to know Till's a long time and have watched him endlessly doing that practice golf swing deal....all day and all nite...no matter the place or whatnot. Now I know what he was thinking while swinging around.

More later. Great stuff Steve.

Gimme my Abe!

Gimme my Abe Lincoln

Gimme gimme gimme my Abe Lincoln

Where is my Abe Lincoln

Here is 5 dollars

Here is some dope

Here is some free stuff

Just gimme my Abe Lincoln

Hey you gimme my Abe Lincoln

Send it send it send it

Gimme my Abe Lincoln

Where is my Abe Lincoln

Where is my Abe Lincoln

Now I am worn down.

(repeat endlessly)

(imagine as Amy Winehouse cover)

Ahh spring!

St. Pats day was a great Lawrence event. 80 degree sunny day, Spring Break, and March Madness nonsense to rev everyone up. Best of all listening to local all girl egghead bluegrass group MAW , a real treat, in much crowded beer garden out back the Replay Lounge. Lots of Kiss Me I'm a Jayhawk and Kiss Me I'm Irish shirts but the prize goes to dude wearing Kiss Me I am Wearing Green Silk Panties. Who would resisit!

Harriet

Someone, maybe Sillimans blog, led me to Harriet the blogsite at Poetry Magazine. The first thing I read is some guy who really, really liked a big poetry reading by 25 people who each read for 5 minutes. I think he thought ALL poetry readings should be like this. Guy probably really liked poetry anthologies that were 3 inches thick, and hated one man art exhibits and songs that lasted more than 1.5 minutes. And he will start a twitter poem site. Perfect!

Personally, it takes me 5 minutes to figure out why I am standing at a podium and then what the fuck to read.

Maybe poets should only read say 4-5 times in a life and then read for 4-5 hours each time.

I guess that is why the www loves poetry and porno so much...you can just find the darndest things.

Imagine that.

I dont know what got me started the other day about all this. Would FOH, if still alive, be all a twitter at age 83 writing about the America's Top Model rampage the other day. Or sitting on his couch with 83 YO BFF Ashes....mumbling about what to choose for YET ANOTHER selected poem collection.


And I thought to myself...I am really tired of hearing about these guys FOH and JA. And here I am doing that.

That's the trouble with old (living) poets. They take up too much space. All poets should die at 40. That would take care of a lot of problems about who was good and who wasn't.

Reading Perloff Re-Reading FOH

I guess if nothing else getting run over dead at a 'young' age keeps you from being belittled
in the end for all that 'not so good' poetry you wrote in later life.

Who was that?

An Actual Kansas event the other nite. A group of three reading prose and poetics ...was it the out of wedlock love daughter of the late David Foster Wallace reading with a stepson of coked out comic Robin Williams followed by the mixgenderedbrother of fellow Topekian singer Iris Dement??

Ah...I am an old guy. What do I know. I stayed awake. Gimme that

These kids...they are good, very good at what they did.

Thanks, Andrei

Jim McCrary, All That, the collected chapbooks, ManyPenny Press, Moscow, Idaho, 2008, 1111 E. Fifth St, MOscow, Idaho 83843. Jim McCrary finally gave in to a perfectly bound collection, after years of publishing his work with determination in ephemeral chapbooks that gained him, nonetheless, a respectful reading from many poets. McCrary doesn't have a good attitude, as evidenced by the following, entitled "Fuck Tolerance": "I fucking hate/ intolerant people.", or, "Fuck You": "This should need no/ explanation." It doesn't, but he wrote it down and we read it. That's something.

Andrei Codrescu, Exquisite Corpse, March 6, 09

More trip

Black is the new black in Hong Kong
really black is the new black
there is nothing no more hip about black
it is very black in Hong Kong

people holding cups of Starbucks deep in a basement
shivering in black
hopeing it aint real black
but it is

I aint gonna go back to that place soon.

On a trip

I just wanna Mekong kat and a Mekong rat
I dont want no Mekong hat
I just wanna Mekong kat
I dont want no Mekong fhat
I just wanna go to sleep on the Mekong and I did

It is all just trippin after all

You get Mekong no

Aint no beer like a Mekong beer

There...that's the deal done and finished.

Oh Come On

It doesn't matter who they are just hope they are not 'waiting for you on the other side'.

Board of Directors