Fields of gold

As we were headed home, Randy stopped so I could snap off these two photos of the wheat field from the truck window.

Berrying (take two)

We didn't find many berries this afternoon, but as I walked along the edge of a cornfield, I ran across this beauty. This particular damselfly has always been especially significant to me, so I'm very happy to get such a great photo.

What I'm quilting now

This is the second of two hand-pieced projects that Mom handed off to me several months ago. I'm doing a basic outline stitch inside each triangle. There are 108 triangle squares, each measuring about one square inch.

Berrying (take one)

I wanted to go berrying this morning, so after a yummy breakfast of ham & eggs on biscuits, we grabbed Sadie and a few small plastic tubs (and Sadie's leash, and a bowl of water, and her grooming bag, and my camera, and Randy's camera, oh and a couple of books and our cell phones), hopped in the truck and headed up to the Overlook trail where we'd been greeted by oodles of damselflies the other day.

Today the place was swarming with gypsy moths, even at mid-day: they were everywhere, and I fear we'll have major damage next spring (I assume they are laying their eggs now on--well, on everything).

A work crew had set a new line of fence posts and was installing hurricane fencing (is there another name for that heavy mesh fencing that people so often use in their yards and dog kennels?) and almost immediately, one of the men called out and warned us that our dog needed to be on a leash. We have her-- leash, I assured him (Randy had taken Sadie off her leash once they were around the corner but not quite out of sight of the persistent nabob who, it turns out, harassed Randy not fifteen minutes later as he sat at a picnic table reading. Sadie had climbed up on the table and Jethro approached and told R to please not allow the dog up there, saying something like "people eat at these tables" (to which R responded, yes, and bugs and animals crawl on them and birds shit on them). Randy ended up taking Sadie to the truck and phoned me that it was time to leave. Jethro even followed him to the truck and started in again.

The problem is that single men are harassed in this park because it has a reputation for being a cruising area. (People with children are routinely allowed to break the "rules.") Well, fine: but arrest the lawbreakers, and leave people the fuck alone who are just trying to quietly enjoy our state parks.

So not enough berries for pie baking. Yet. Tomorrow we hit site #2.

* * * * *
An unpleasant e-mail this morning: I've been asked to turn in my key to Bucknell Hall before July 13th. Though it's understandable that departing faculty or staff should turn in their keys, I'm not really going anywhere. I've made it clear from the start of my interim editorship that I'll be around to handle West Branch biz over the summer (not the way our regular editor usually operates, but it makes no sense to me to put stuff on hold until mid-August when we're all in the frenzy of teaching preps). So okay, so fine, I'm done. I'm done, and here's my key, and if there are any fires to put out before September, well good luck with that.

* * * * *
I wasn't going to rant about that. Oh well. Screw it.

* * * * *
The Lewisburg July 4 parade is tomorrow morning, and the fireworks display is tonight. It's just grown dark as I type this out on the patio. A firefly has landed on my wrist and is making his ticklish journey up my arm--against the grain, as it were--but hasn't yet emitted its lovely greeny-yellow lantern light. I think the laptop screen is drawing them. When Randy drove to the store earlier--around six--he said that folks were already setting up their lawn chairs along the parade route. We're a small town. Those chairs will still be there in the morning.

[photo: nasturtium, 6/24/07]

New Mini

Here's the new mini. I finished the binding last night and washed the quilt in the kitchen sink, then hung it up to dry. It's ready to be mailed. The center checkerboard top was hand pieced by my Mom; I added the border, backing, and vintage 1940s binding and did the hand quilting in an overall "Baptist Fan" pattern. The quilt measures 8.75 x 12.75 inches.

* * * * *
Dad's procedure went well: one stent and several balloons, which, my sister says, is good.

Damselfly

Here's one of the damselflies we saw the other day. Really gorgeous dusty blue. I'm happy with this photo: you can see all the webbing in the wings. I must have taken 20 shots of this particular critter--it was very patient with me!

* * * * *
Hot day. I'm happy to be able to work in a nice, quiet, air-conditioned office.

* * * * *
They started cutting down several hemlock trees beside Bucknell Hall last week, to make way for a backhoe to dig a new steam line. I had not walked past the building in a few days, but this afternoon I did. Absolute carnage. A wound in the earth. I felt a piercing synesthetic moment, a visceral body shock at the sight of the ravaged space.

* * * * *
My dad's surgery is scheduled for tomorrow morning. Please send good thoughts.

Why I am not a banker

I forgot to pay Nancy & Bill last week. I realized it the morning that Nancy flew home, and put the checks in the mail immediately (same day), but it's a huge embarrassment. Doh. Double-doh.

* * * * *

We took a short trail walk this weekend up at the Overlook, a few miles out of town near Winfield: it's a wooded state park atop a rocky bluff that overlooks the river confluence at Northumberland. Two things of note: the wild raspberries are almost ripe (any day now), and there were damselflies everywhere! Probably hundreds. More than I've ever seen. Bright electric powder-blue, pale tawny yellow, all with transparent wings. All along the trail, clinging to trees, hovering near, alighting on grasses, but almost never holding still enough for me to get a good photo. Will see what I have in the camera. There should be at least one decent shot.

* * * * *

Last time I visited my folks (too long ago), Mom showed me two tiny quilt tops she had hand-pieced and asked if I thought we could make anything out of them. Sure, I said. And brought them home and set them on the bookcase in our dining room. So two weeks ago, during the June Seminar, I finished up a project and wanted something portable and remembered these really small tops (have I mentioned that they're really small? like, each square is maybe a half-inch across?), so I found a coordinating fabric to make a narrow border and used two scrap pieces of self-basting batting to put the thing together. (Self-basting batting, because you're dying to know, is slightly "sticky" and adheres when pressed between fabrics with a hot iron. It's too messy for larger quilts but really perfect for very small projects.)

So the quilt is a basic checkerboard design in two fabrics, a pale pink mini print and a sort of teal green floral. I used a medium rose-pink for the border, which will be about one inch wide when finished. The quilting pattern I decided to go with is an all-over "Baptist fan" design, which looks like tight concentric arcs that overlap in a kind of shell pattern. It has a LOT of quilting in it, and I'm nearly done. Yesterday I rummaged around and found a piece of vintage paisley dress fabric from the 1940s, which I'll use to make the binding. Will post photos by the end of the week. (Just indulge me; I'm really into this quilting thing.)

* * * * *

Quiet weekend. Quiet Monday. I did get some more poetry books listed on eBay, including Daisy Fried's second book and chapbooks by Alison Funk & Catherine Pierce. Prices are cheap and all the money goes to my press. Check 'em out.

[switching OFF shameless self-promotion mode]

[photo: blooming hosta in our garden, 6/21]

Lodestar sinks

I was sorry to hear that Lodestar Quarterly had folded: it's sad to lose another LGBTQ venue. Wishing Patrick Ryan all the best.

* * * * *

The Keystone Chapbook Prize is off to a great start! Thanks to all the folks who are spreading the word.

* * * * *

Moving out of my borrowed office this weekend is another reminder of how much paper I still manage to accumulate in a matter of a few months. Recycling isn't the problem; I just need to be more efficient at handling stuff when I first get it.

Yeah. I make piles.

[photo: shrub rose, 6/9/07]

Prose poems: a wide line?

This afternoon, a few of us walked over to Zelda's for fruit smoothies (I had a frozen chai, yumm) and a nice chat about the prose poem. Betsy passed around some books and chapbooks (I was especially drawn to Give Up by Andrew Michael Roberts) (check out all the gorgeous handbound books at Tarpaulin Sky Press) and we read a few poems. One of the interesting notions that came up is Gary Young's notion of the prose poem as one continuous line. I hope I got that right, because it makes so much sense to me: when we abandon control over the line, we have to rely on other devices to keep the poem alive and moving forward. But if we could envision a poem as one long, extended line (I think of taping a paper banner--say, six feet long--to the wall, and writing with no anxiety over the right margin), how might this alter the ways in which we imagine it and bring it into language?

I wanna try this.

Someone's poem (I should have kept notes) reminded me of the imagery in James Wright's "How My Fever Left," and it's interesting that, in that moment, I actually remembered it as a prose poem (Wright used the form well, but of course this particular poem does not). Here's Wright's poem, from The Branch Will Not Break (1963):

How My Fever Left

I can still hear her.
She hobbles downstairs to the kitchen.
She is swearing at the dishes.
She slaps her grease rags
Into a basket,
And slings it over her skinny forearm, crooked
With hatred, and stomps outside.
I can hear my father downstairs,
Standing without a coat in the open back door,
Calling to the old bat across the snow.
She’s forgotten her black shawl,
But I see her through my window, sneering,
Flapping upward
Toward some dark church on the hill.
She has to meet somebody else, and
It’s no use, she won’t listen,
She’s gone.

[photo: some black raspberries I picked for my honey on the way home today]

A few days

The June Seminar is winding down: Nancy Eimers leaves in the morning, and the Fellows depart on Thursday. We'll miss them. I'm already looking toward the rest of my summer--moving my office, completing a few final WB tasks, planning out a new course, transitioning into a new campus, working on new poems and trying to finish one of the two manuscripts I've been juggling for too long now--and the first task alone is daunting. Too much paper. So many books. Another reason to stay home, read for the sheer pleasure of it, spend some time with Randy.

And there's always the garden. The columbines are starting to release their first seeds: the pale green clawlike pods split open and out fall shiny black seeds, smaller than sesame seeds and more rounded, more oval. I want to set up lights on the basement landing (just off the kitchen) and start some more perennials. It's much too hot in the attic now.

* * * * *

Last week, Bill Olsen and I were talking about Thomas Lynch and recommending his wonderful book The Undertaking to someone (can't remember who). Bill said that Lynch was an advisor to Six Feet Under (possibly my favorite TV series ever), and that his name can be found in the credits! How did I not know this?

Here's a poem from Thomas Lynch's Still Life in Milford:

Vigil

Rose, you are the winter oak
whose spent leaves redden and remain
limp emblems of the heart’s accustomed hold
on this—the known life of seasons,
daylights, nightfalls, weathers—
the ordinary calendars, mean time.
Ordinarily we live our lives out
hopeful and afloat among the rounded metaphors:
seedtime and harvest, dark and dawn;
solstice and equinox, calm, storm.
Ignoring the linear paradigms we move
buoyantly between our pasts and futures
gamely trading prospects for remembrances,
deaf to the regular changing of tenses—
those doorways slamming down the narrowing hall.
Behind the doors, we hear the voices still:
Goodnight. Godspeed. God Bless. Get Well. Goodbye.
The deaths we seldom grieve but set our watches by.

* * * * *

[photo: beetle I released from my office yesterday]

KEYSTONE CHAPBOOK PRIZE

The KEYSTONE CHAPBOOK PRIZE is up and running. See full guidelines below. Open to Pennsylvania poets and PA-themed manuscripts. Please spread the word!

* * * * *
SEVEN KITCHENS PRESS
2007 Keystone Chapbook Award – for Pennsylvania Poets
Prize: $100 plus 25 copies.
Submission deadline: Postmarked between June 17 and August 17 of each year.
Eligibility: Open to all Pennsylvania poets [see complete guidelines below].

COMPLETE GUIDELINES:

Any poet who was born, has lived, or currently lives in Pennsylvania is eligible to submit to the Keystone Chapbook Award. Additionally, poets living elsewhere may submit manuscripts which show a strong connection to Pennsylvania.

Submit a paginated manuscript of 16-20 pages (not including front matter) of poetry. Include two cover pages: one with the manuscript title, author name, address, e-mail and phone number; the second cover page should have the manuscript title only. Include a table of contents page. Include, if applicable, an acknowledgments page for work previously published.Please include, on a separate page, a brief (100-150 words) biographical note, which must address your specific connection to Pennsylvania (if you do not currently reside here).

The author’s name should not appear in the manuscript.

Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but you must notify us promptly if your manuscript is accepted elsewhere.

Submissions must be posted between June 17 and August 17. The winning manuscript will be announced on or before October 15. Manuscript finalists will also be announced, and may be eligible for spring/summer publication in the Keystone Chapbook Series.

Manuscripts will not be returned. E-mailed submission is preferred, but you may send via regular mail.

Do not staple or bind your manuscript. If you are sending by mail, please use a binder clip and mail flat in an 8.5 x 11 envelope. If you are sending by e-mail, please send one document in Microsoft Word format (.doc or .rtf files are ideal); you must include the words “Keystone Chapbook” in the subject line of your e-mail.

Include a $12 reading fee with each manuscript you submit. Multiple submissions are acceptable. Checks should be made payable to Ron Mohring. Online payment may be made via PayPal to sevenkitchens at yahoo dot com. Each entrant will receive one copy of the winning chapbook, to be published on or before December 31.

The winner will receive $100 and 25 copies of their chapbook. Additionally, the publisher will distribute ten review copies and will solicit online reviews of the chapbook.

Send your manuscript:
~ by e-mail, as a Microsoft Word attachment, to: sevenkitchens at yahoo dot com; or
~ by mail to Ron Mohring, Publisher & Editor; PO Box 668; Lewisburg PA 17837.

Poke

Pokeweed, that is: such a lovely plant, really, with purple stems, intense green leaves, and creamy flower spikes like this one. Of course the deep purple berries are beautiful in the fall as well. This plant is blooming in a stand of wild raspberries that I'm keeping my eye on.

* * * * *

Congratulations to Jeff Mann on his Lammy! It's about time!

* * * * *

Randy's cooking Indian tonight: we're having company. I need to break down my sewing station so we can use the dining table. (I'm making a miniature album quilt, with blocks signed by the faculty and fellows in the June Seminar. Pictures available soon.)

* * * * *

[photo: Pokeweed blossom, 6/13/07]

Don't do this

I was just talking last week about the time I lost my pocket journal (one of those miniature pocket-sized composition books) in the laundry. You'd think that, having done it once, I'd now have the sense to double-check my pockets, but this photo shows what's left of yet another journal that went through the wash. (Randy, bless him, discovered it before it went through the dryer.) It's still damp, but there appears to be a lot of ink left inside. I'm waiting for it to dry on the windowsill before I attempt to prise apart the pages and see what remains.

I don't lose things. This is what I tell myself: they are not lost. They're around. They're right where they're supposed to be. It's just that, temporarily, I can't recall where I left them: my post office box key (why did I take it off the key ring in the first place?); my pocketknife; a favorite photograph of my mother that I tucked into a book but then, because I couldn't recall which book, it essentially went missing for several years. And when they show up, there's always this of course moment: not so much found as reestablished, slipping through the muzzy veil of my consciousness into my visible, tangible world again.

Writers, check your pockets twice.

* * * * *

My book auctions are back again over at eBay. I'll be listing a bunch of poetry over the next few weeks, as well as some other stuff. All monies go to support my publishing venture, Seven Kitchens Press. Please check back often.

Metaphor and a manual typewriter

Deirdre led an interesting session this morning with the June Poets: a "poetic identity" metaphor exercise, in which each writer describes or invents a metaphorical identity--for example, "as a poet, I am the bridge: I connect but remain fixed; the world travels both over and under me . . ." (and so on) (my own poor example, not D's). Then we all wrote for about twenty minutes to expand/ embellish the metaphor (or start with a fresh one), and finally, the papers were shuffled and redistributed so we each received someone else's metaphor. We then read them aloud. The next step is for each of us to write a poem for Friday that somehow inhabits or responds to the metaphors we were given. I've done this exercise in the past; it always prompts something interesting.

* * * * *
When I inherited Bob Taylor's office for a year, I also got his Royal typewriter: a hefty monster that I moved to my current office last summer. Today I lugged it downhill to the Poetry Center and set it up in the reading library, hoping the poets might have some fun by collaborating on a few poems, pecking them out line by line.

* * * * *
It's great to see that Earl Pickens' new video is getting steady attention. A few weeks ago, having been given the heads up by Earl himself, Randy and I walked over to Market Street to watch the filming of the video's last segment in front of the Campus Theatre, where they changed the marquee to display Earl's name (and his new song title). Nice. And yes, he really does know how to ride that unicycle. Even if I could ride one, I'd be too terrified to do it across the George Washington Bridge (and that goes double for the New Jersey Turnpike).

* * * * *
I'm really slow at reading literary journals, and look forward to the summer when I can catch up. I love this poem by Catherine Bowman, from the spring '06 issue of Ploughshares edited by (former June Poet) Kevin Young:

Names of Tulips, Good Friday

All Winter I’ve Waiteds.
The Then You Came Backs.
Wands. Wounds. Tarot Cups. Lisps.
Strapless Dresses. Sylvia Tears.
Conjugations. Anne Frank’s Looms.
Another Man Done Gone.
Kleenex After Sex. Mrs. Manner’s Accidents.
The How Funerals.
The Greedy Toos.
Freaks. The What Happens Every Afternoon.
The Purple Spot on My Neck.
The Eye Tricks. Children’s Bibles.
The Favorite Parts of His Body.
His Forty Last Words.

June swirl

The June Seminar is in full swing. I'm re-reading poems for my afternoon workshop. The June Poets (the early risers anyway) are over in the seminar room for an informal discussion/ knockdown on Frank O'Hara vs. Wallace Stevens (poetry of lived experience vs. poetry of the imagination).

It's raining gently; the tiger lily that rises into a double tower outside this basement office window is spangled with rain, like beads on its frilly crowns. It leans slightly away from the window, as if nodding. (We watched "The Queen" yesterday on DVD and the imagery has obviously lingered--so much decorous pressure!)

Karla Kelsey and Bill Olsen arrive this week, Karla for a one-day visit and Bill for half the Seminar. I just picked up Bill's new book, Avenue of Vanishing. Still in its shrinkwrap, it waits here on my desk for a block of quiet time. I think he's an amazing poet. So many of his lines strike like little hammers in my brain.

My father is having a procedure this morning. They're trying to save his legs.

Sun breaks through for a moment, then retreats. A crow in the hemlocks beside Bucknell Hall shakes down a shower of rain to the slate sidewalk. The windowsill, a white box one foot deep, is at chin level. When I stand to look out at the lilies, I see there are three lesser stems in addition to the two tall ones. Later this summer, they will bloom, bright orange with dark speckles, heavy with pollen: the petals will unhinge and fall after only a few days. All along the stem, each leaf axis will cradle a small purple-black bulbil. These grow to about the size of a pea before being dislodged and falling to the ground. I collected some three years ago; one of the plants that grew from them is a foot tall and may bloom this year. My grandfather had these lilies in his garden; when I was about ten, he showed me the bulbils one day, thumbing one off the stem and handing it to me: If you plant this, it will make another one.

Here's a poem by Brendan Galvin, from Great Blue (1990):

Glass

What the warbler must have seen
was the world swung round;
without turning back
she was flying into
a distance already passed through:

another side of the woodpile
she had just cleared in a single pitch,
and beyond, through the middle ground
of pines, the background glitter
of running sea she had skipped above
like a flat stone thrown so well
it touches down on water
all the way to the other shore.

Swung round,
only slightly blurred.
Trees twinning,
far water grained,
air of a density . . .

then that split-second insight

into splashes of newspaper
and clothing,
filtered through
final dusts of light.

As perhaps,
in our last seconds,
we are swung round
to live ourselves back through
each particular,
to fall faster and faster
out of loves, out of
changes of clothes,
whole snows lifting skyward
becoming autumn leaves lifting
back into the green trees,
the dead stepping out of
crumbling loam,

at the last, seed and egg
unraveling, falling away.

And all
in the time
it takes a flat stone to skip over water
and be let in.

[photo: Crow, May 15]

Half-days

That's all I can commit to the office lately, even though I have tons of work to prepare for my fall classes and a few lingering details to close out with West Branch. The weather's just too nice to stay indoors; I need to slow down and recharge; it's good to spend quality time with Randy. All the above.

Walking home, I've been noticing the gorgeous drifts of bluets on the hill above Bucknell Hall: one of the delightful "common names" for these tiny flowers is Quaker Ladies. They form miniscule clumps just a few inches high, and each bears more flowers than leaves. Every year I dig up a few with my pocketknife, to carry home and plant in our small lawn, hoping they'll "take"--we had only one plant come back from seed this year, but I've read that they're finicky about cross-pollination: a clump will not self-fertilize, but must be cross-pollinated with a separate plant, thus strengthening the species. I'm going to keep a closer watch on them this year, and try to harvest some fresh seeds before the mowers get them all.
* * * * *

Congratulations to Robin Becker, who will be the Gary J. Sojka Visiting Poet at Bucknell this fall. Robin will give a Q & A at 4 pm, and a reading at 7 pm, on November 6.
* * * * *
[photo: bluets, 5/6/07]

Time

I don't manage time as well as I could. Just writing that sentence has me quibbling with the notion that time can be managed: it can't. It just happens. It's more accurate for me to say that I don't follow through on half my ideas and plans. During the semester, there's a constant underlying aura of stress--not enough time (to write, for example; or to do things with my husband, which is equally important), though I've trained myself to allow for "down time" and try not to feel guilty about that.

Summers are more complicated: this is one of the lucky years in which I'm "coasting" on a twelve-month salary, every penny of which is earned (thank you) from August through May. Each day presents the opportunity for down time, or its illusion anyway, because I had to set aside so many projects during the academic year and can't even begin to decide which to focus on now. So I garden, full-tilt, immersing myself in it for a day or two until my back aches, though every hour in the garden is worth it, especially now when the changes come so quickly: the heirloom irises I snagged from Mom's garden a couple years ago suddenly have buds: first one, then a second later the same day, then a third the next morning--I could almost believe that, if I chose the right moment, I might actually be able to sit and watch them emerge from their envelope-like casings.

Yesterday we had intermittent rain (which we needed); I worked a few hours in my office on lingering West Branch stuff. It was nice to work at a relaxed pace and to leave early. The rain let up in the afternoon, long enough for me to get out and plant the basil seedlings: these are the Genovese basils I started in an egg carton under lights in the attic. A few weeks ago, when I repotted the "Fish" peppers from their egg carton, the basils were ready to be upsized as well, but I had no room. So I'm afraid that forcing them to overstay their cramped quarters may be detrimental. I guess we'll see.

I popped all eighteen plants into two of the upended clay drainage tiles I've set alongside the patio. We tried basil in one of them last year (the other two held rau rom and an ancient sorrel plant that finally gave up the ghost this winter) and it was such a huge success that we're going all-basil this season. The third planter (or first--the one with the most sunlight) is reserved for spicy globe basil, which is coming along very well in the attic and is just about ready to transplant.

In the laundry room-cum-garden shed, I dug out an old roll of copper sheeting ("craft" copper that I think we originally bought with the idea of covering some birhouse roofs) and cut strips to crimp around the edges of one basil planter. The damp weather had drawn out the slugs, which were all over the lemon balm, and I remembered reading that a copper barrier is supposed to curtail snails and their slime-footed cousins by generating an electrical shock as they slither across it. So, as an experiment, I covered the edges of one planter with w two-inch wide strip of copper, but left the other bare. Will report back if I notice any definitive results.

Oh: I also planted nine geranium seedlings in a heavy old painted metal planter that I swiped from beside the neighbor's garage--there are three more planters, they've been there for years (really, the ivy that covers that area has started to cover these planters as well) and I figure if they notice one's missing and say anything, I'll apologize and offer them a fern or something. The geraniums are a Burpee mix that came up very quickly and developed nice, stocky plants under the attic lights. I've had them in individual pots on the laundry room sill for two weeks.

A confession: gardening reinforces my OCD tendency to "collect" containers. I find it very hard to resist "trying out" various plastic containers, for example, to see how well they'll serve as flowerpots. For a few years, I saved Dannon yogurt cups, because they came with clear plastic lids and were thus great for starting really small seeds (like coleus). This winter, I started stockpiling my plastic Diet Coke bottles in a desk drawer. I cut them basically in half, and they made very serviceable planters for the move from egg carton stage to windowsill stage. [An aside: getting the geraniums out of their Coke bottle planters was problematic, because of the bottles "narrow hipped" shape. Normally, a good slap on the bottom is enough to dislodge a healthy root ball from a properly-tapered planter. I had to repeatedly slap, shake, and jiggle the plants out, which caused needless stress to their root systems. I think they'll bounce right back, but clearly I need to go back to yogurt cups: they few geraniums I grew in some leftover yogurt cups slipped right out with roots and soil in a nice, intact ball.]

So I'll be washing the Coke cut-downs and tossing them into the recycle bag this week. Randy will be relieved: he's already embarrassed by some of the containers I hang onto, and calls me a White Trash Gardener, a moniker I've totally earned. But it's worth the results.

Grades are in

Turned the last of my grades in today. This is done online, which is actually pretty nice: you can log in and add (or change) final grades up until the deadline, at which point they process the whole thing. (I haven't a clue about the proper terminology.) Anyway, I graded portfolios on Thursday, on Friday, on Saturday, on Sunday. So I practically skipped all the way home this afternoon: what to do first?

The garden, of course: two weekends ago, I got up early Saturday to haul our garden clippings (branches, leaves, pine needles, pulled weeds) over to the dump. Well, it's not exactly a dump, though folks haul their yard waste there. The borough brings in these ENORMOUS grinding machines, which pulverize bamboo, whole shrubs, entire christmas trees, into great mounds of mulch, which is periodically turned by bulldozer. So you drop off your green stuff and take away free mulch. I brought home half a truckload and piled it in a corner of the driveway.

So I have some catching up to do in the garden. It was so nice to get out there for a few hours. The columbines are just blooming--these are plants I grew from seed last year, and they were marvelous; they're much smaller this year, though the double flowers are still wonderful. All the ferns and hostas are up; the ajuga is in full bloom (both the blue-violet and a nice pale lavender), but the show-stealers this week are the sweet violets, which we've been encouraging for a few years now. They're in full bloom, just beautiful.

We have a small patch of Lily-of-the-valley that's just now in bloom. The scent carries through the whole yard, heavier than freesia, an almost unbearably sweet perfume that takes me back to my childhood: I used to feel so proud to pick a wee bouquet for my Mom every May.

* * * * *
Congratulations to Jim Harms, whose poem "We Started Home, My Son and I" (from West Branch # 58) has won a Pushcart Prize!

Wordsworth rap

Just watch it.

CFS: WATERSHED: A Journal of the Susquehanna

Watershed: a Journal of the Susquehanna is an interdisciplinary annual print and online journal, with its debut issue slated for late 2007 publication. The journal’s mission is to promote the culture, history, environment, literature, and art of the Susquehanna watershed region, which includes parts of upstate New York, much of Pennsylvania, and parts of Maryland leading to the Chesapeake. We seek thought-provoking nonfiction on regional history, cultural and environmental issues, and top quality and inventive poetry and fiction. While contributors need not reside in the Susquehanna region, the work must evoke the Susquehanna and its hills, valleys, and, most importantly, its people. Of course, these influences could be as varied as the geography of the watershed.

Prose should be double-spaced, while poetry may be single spaced. Black and white artwork and photography should be reduced to a 5” by 7” format (or smaller if appropriate) and sent as electronic files. Electronic submissions are preferred, with text in MS Word format. Submission deadline is July 15. Contributors will receive three copies. For more information, contact Jerry Wemple via email at jwemple@bloomu.edu.

Bigger Fish

My "Fish" peppers are growing nicely in their egg carton, though the attic is starting to get a bit too warm. The mature plants have neat striped and swirled foliage; so far, these are uniformly green. We're at that tricky stage where I really want to repot them into individual containers but lack the room to accommodate so many plants. I want a greenhouse.

Hmmm. . . I just noticed, in the closeup photo, that something has taken a couple of bites from a leaf!

Just a word

Just a word before I toddle up to bed: spring! The weekend presented us with stunning, beautiful weather; I felt ridiculous trying to grade papers out on the patio, using small stones from the garden to weight down the pages from the wind, glancing up at every bird jostling in the privet hedge or crabapple tree. The hammock called. The garden called. I did a little weeding and raked half the perennial bed, then graded some more. Sunday was as gorgeous as Saturday had been; as the evening light diminished I hurried outside one last time to pull a few weeds (okay, they weren't weeds, but an explosively invasive ground cover that--I confess--I introduced two years ago into the garden; I can't remember the name but I will look it up; I really thought it would look delightful there with its bright, almost metallic yellow buttercup-like blooms, but the darned thing sends endless runners and I think, oh yikes, it even re-seeds), a bucketful, lying along the brick path and gently tugging them out one by one as I tried not to disturb the species tulips (which are absurdly delicate, with flopsy leaves that break off easily but really wonderful single yellow flowers that start off as pale downward-pointing beaks on wiry sinuous stems--the stems gradually extend to hold the buds erect; they're not like your average big honking Dutch tulips; very small but bright).

If it grows cold and snowy again I shall lie down in protest. The bumblebees are zooming; the chickadees are--well, they're fucking: it's amazing how much fuss and commotion two tiny birds can make in midair; the Japanese maple is just about to burst open; the railroad tracks are littered with chartreuse clusters of fallen maple blossoms; the lawns are dotted with early sweet violets; and I'm just about ready to roll around, nibble some grass and positively neigh.

[photo: maple blossom along railroad track, 4.23.07]

Fitting it all in

Oh, get your minds out of the gutter. I was just thinking that it's been almost a week since I went to Lock Haven, where they treated us exceptionally well: nice group dinner beforehand, *reserved* parking spaces on campus *next* to the venue (whoda thunkit?), and a good-sized audience: mostly students who seemed to have read at least some of the work ahead of time. Oh, and the check was nice, too. Thanks again to Marjorie, Jerry, and the LHU English Department. And it's never too late to buy a copy of the Common Wealth anthology: click here for more information and a "buy it" link.

* * *

Randy is on a well-earned break, a road trip to visit an old friend from our Houston days (hello, Hadi!). I haven't gone out yet for junk food, so I may be handling this better than expected. We rarely--and I mean, rarely--spend a day apart, and I can think of only one occasion in recent years when Randy took a road trip (hi, Martin). I've been lucky enough to give a few readings or trek to AWP every other year. . . Anyway, I've a stack of papers to attend to, so the television stays off tonight. We've about two weeks left in the semester: I'm meeting with three or four students every day, there's a lot of West Branch business that needs my attention [final editorial decisions for "my" issue will be made on the 27th], and all the details of the June Seminar are being put into place. (Writing, you ask? Who has time to write? --I asked my students to write ghazals this week, and, unable to find three solid examples that didn't take too many liberties with the form, I ended up dashing off example #3. I called it "Spontaneous Ghazal." Does that count?) (Does this?)

* * *

Today, in my intro cw class, we studied Thomas Rabbitt's "Meter Reader*." I'm introducing slant rhyme tomorrow and Thursday. They're writing quatrains for next week and sonnets after that. I almost wish we had an extra month.

*-see Behn & Twichell, The Practice of Poetry

* * *

"Daily poem" for today's class: I read Jill Rosser's "Lover Release Agreement," from her second book, Misery Prefigured. She can work a mean sonnet:

Lover Release Agreement

Against his lip, whose service has been tendered

lavishly to me, I hold no lien.

Here's his heart, which finally has blundered

from my custody. Here's his spleen.

Hereafter let your hair and eyes and breasts

be venue for his daydreams and his nights.

Here are smart things I've said, and all the rest

you'll hear about. Here are all our fights.

Now, whereas I waive rights to his kiss,

the bed you've shared with him has rendered null

his privilege in mine. Know that, and this:

undying love was paid to me in full.

No matter how your pleasures with him shine,

you'll always be comparing them to mine.

Best comment in class today: the "Oh, SNAP!" someone uttered after hearing the poem.

* * *

New Bloom

The new issue of Bloom finally arrived about a week ago; I had to set it aside to focus on some deadlines. Just getting back to it--bit by bit, as I usually read journals (How do you read journals? Does anyone actually go cover-to-cover?)--and I'm happy to see a couple of nice sonnets by Brad Gooch (whose work I love) and Jeff Crandall (whose work I'd love to get to know).

Nice cover, too.

* * *

Speaking of covers, the advance copy of West Branch arrived in the offices today: it looks terrific. (Click here to see the cover image by Harold Reddicliffe.)

* * *

Cynthia Hogue and Bob Taylor gave a wonderful reading tonight in Bucknell Hall. It was delightful to have them back.

* * *

Lock Haven Wednesday

I'm heading over with Deirdre O'Connor to Lock Haven University on Wednesday night to take part in the Common Wealth reading: joining us will be former colleague Cynthia Hogue, who is in town to read at Bucknell Hall on Tuesday night with Robert Love Taylor.

* * *
Yes, I'm leaving West Branch in a month. Yes, we'll get back to you on anything you haven't gotten word on yet. In fiction, we're full up, so I'm closing down those submissions a week early. We're still reading through what's come in, still talking about several stories, so this does not mean "abandon hope" if'n yer still waitin'. . .

* * *
Meanwhile, is anyone looking for a guest editor?

Still here

Well after a series of somewhat contradictory e-mails, I accepted the offer to teach my "Poetry, Identity, Community" course again this fall at Bucknell. On the plus side (believe it or not), the class meets on T/R mornings at 8:00, so I'll be done at 9:30 and can hole up in my office (wherever that may be) and grade papers. Of course I'll revise the course this summer (I always do), but I need to select books very soon. I'm thinking I'll use chapbooks again, along with some online essays and audio.

* * *
I saw a beautiful ribbon snake this afternoon on campus: it was sunning on some rocks along the creek that runs past Bucknell Hall. Maybe 16 inches long, a bit muddy. Taking advantage of the yummy warm temps and sunny day. I knelt on the sidewalk and talked to it for a while as I fished in my bookbag for the camera. It raised up, swiveled its head and opened its mouth in a kind of hacking gesture, all the while flicking its tongue to gauge my scent. I took only one photo--too far away--and before I could zoom, la serpiente threaded down between some stones and disappeared beneath the leaves.

* * *
New favorite workout song: Joan Osborne's "Hurricane." I remember being totally bummed when Joan's "Relish" was eclipsed by Alanis Morrisette's "Jagged Little Pill" at the Grammys (way back when). To tell the truth, I haven't kept up with her music, but I recently downloaded some tracks from "Righteous Love" and can't get enough of this song (or of her ass-kicking "My Love Is Alive" cover). My girl is hot!

* * *
Re-reading Mary Ruefle's Indeed I Was Pleased With the World (new from Carnegie Mellon). I can't think of another living poet whose vision is so acutely attuned; she just blows me away time and time again. I can't put this book down; I drink from it and want more. Here is "My Timid Eternity":

I am thinking how lonesome it will be in Heaven
with only George Washington and me there.
I suppose we will recite the Beatitudes
and wonder when they are coming--
the meek, the merciful, the peacemakers,
those who are pure in heart.
Roasting marshmallows in the evening
I will broach the subject of lies.
He will hand me a wig
and some leeches, which I will decline,
still thinking about the others--
if they went to the Babies Camp by mistake
we could maybe get a letter out.
Heaven should not be full of worry
but if anyone knows more about it than this,
if you have your own version--
leafy, airy, full, fountainous--
bless you, you are more lonesome
than either the General or I.

* * *
And here are the concluding lines of "Quick Note About the Think Source":

The rest is almost history: volcanic holes, small
French paintings, one-eyed bats, a handwritten note
wedged between the doors of a church. And oh, one
more thing: when asked, if you say "I do not dance,"
the next day an infant is born without feet.

* * *

Springing

Our seedlings are starting to emerge. I have okra "North & South," a nice dwarf geranium, lots of Genovese basil, and a full tray of these: an heirloom medium-hot pepper called "Fish" that we first tried last year. The fruits are smallish, maybe a couple inches long at most, striped and swirled green and yellow and white (and red if left on the plant to mature), and the foliage is a pretty marbled green-and-white. We bought six plants at the local farmers' market last year--all they had--because I recognized the label from an heirloom seed catalog. Yesterday morning, just one seedling was up; by the time I got home from work, 15 of the 18 cups had "hatched" (I reuse foam egg cartons). Look at their little swan necks, the pale cotyledons on the far right plant already opening like a beak. Of course, I'm doing all the crowing.

Offer

Because I split my time this semester between two offices, I often don't make it to my PC (or telephone) until Tuesdays. Truly, I'm not much of a phone person--never have been--but I wish I'd been near it today: apparently Friday's interview went well enough, because they're offering me the job. I had ducked into the West Branch office long enough to use the computer (to print out a quiz for my 1:00 class) and checked my webmail, where I saw the heads-up. Then had to go to class and a couple of meetings.

Randy and I celebrated by going to Staples to buy me a proper office chair (I have a corner table set up at home for grading papers and using the laptop). We'll have a proper toast once I sign a contract.

More details soon.

Dear Contributor,

Thank you for the opportunity to consider your work, but we are sorry to inform you that it does not meet our needs at this time. As you know, there are many reasons why editors reject work, including limitation of space in the journal. Submissions are welcome from September 1 through March 1. Please note that we cannot accept submissions except during this time.

The Editors, Arts & Letters Journal of Contemporary Culture

* * *
To which I want to inquire: how does having one's story rejected make one a "contributor"--wouldn't "Dear Writer" better serve this purpose?

Ah, rejection slips: how would you prefer yours to be written?

Snakes and Ladders

The Joni Mitchell song "Snakes and Ladders" has been playing in my head (and on my MP3 player) a lot these days: Get to the top and slide back down/ Get to bottom, climb back up . . . Found out this past week that my West Branch position won't be renewed. Bleh.

On the positive side, I had a teaching interview on Friday. I'll let you know when there's any news.

* * *
Randy completed a new quilt last week; this afternoon I finished binding it. Will post photos soon. Meanwhile, I've been paper-piecing a set of Gate Latch blocks. Not sure how I'll set them yet.

* * *
Last week we enjoyed watching a number of snow geese and tundra swans in the fields along the river. They'd come in as huge, loose flocks: long twisting pennants of several hundred birds, like a living sculpture. What a treat to see them every spring.

Vern(al)

Happy spring to all y'all.

Many changes happening. More soon.

Back--

Back in the 'burg, where I've been racing to complete work from last week. Though it was a relief to go without internet access in Atlanta, I may not completely catch up for a few more days.

It was a true delight to meet so many folks at the West Branch table: writers we've published (like Randy DeVita, whose story "Riding the Doghouse" has been selected by Stephen King for inclusion in the 2007 edition of Best American Short Stories), writers we've encouraged, lots of former June Poets (Rebecca Dunham, Susan B.A. Somers-Willett, J.D. Smith, Alex Quinlan, Matt Siegel, Amanda Auchter, Kristin Aardsma, Erin Smith, Ilya Kaminsky, Christopher Lirette, Jennifer Perrine, Greg Wrenn). After the Atlanta LGBTQ reading, organized by Collin Kelley, I had a wonderful lunch with Franklin Abbott, whose early work in RFD was instrumental in helping me to define my own early queer identity.

Next week is our spring break. I'll be grading midterm portfolios and generally catching up.

[photo: Night Window, Jan 11 2007]

Off--

--to AWP in the morning. The past week has been a blur of preparations and extra conferencing with my students. I may post from Atlanta. If you're coming to AWP, stop by the West Branch table!

[photo: Bucknell, Night Series]

Ilya Kaminsky

Ilya Kaminsky gave a wonderful reading on campus last night. I've corresponded with him via e-mail a few times over the years, but we'd never met. He's delightfully engaging, warm, and surprisingly funny. He ran up and down the aisles in the Stadler Center, passing around copies of Dancing in Odessa and asking everyone to share. It was an experience: folks in the old wooden pews, heads bent over their shared books, following along as Ilya read, now hushed, now galloping dramatically through the language in a style that could only be described as religious fervor.

He's giving a Writers at Work talk today at noon. I've urged my students to attend.

[photo: Blue Wall, Night Series, 1/11/07]

I bet he can swim reeeeeeeally fast

Gotta love the four-legged duckling. See the full story here at CNN.

Gate of Heaven: Two Hour Delay

Among the scrolling list of school closings this morning, this one made me chuckle. It's a cold walk to campus these days. And a two-hour wait at the big gate.

* * * * *
Thanks to Charlie for the Sally Ball pages! I owe you.

* * * * *





[photo: drifting snow against the West Branch office window, 2/15/07]

Snow

It's been snowing steadily all day since early this morning, when there was talk on the local station about 12-18 inches' accumulation. I haven't checked the weather report since. It's nice. I like it. I'm happy I can walk to work.

* * * * *
For all you eBayers out there, I'll be listing a few books--mainly poetry--over the next couple of months, partly to ease the clutter, but mainly to raise a little cash toward a new project: Seven Kitchens Press will launch this summer with the Keystone Chapbook Series (for Pennsylvania poets). If all goes well, we'll read this fall for a new G/L/B/T chapbook series. Wish me luck. Buy some stuff on eBay to help support the cause: the seller ID is 7kp and the prices are cheap!

* * * * *

Help! (I need somebody)

Not just anybody, but someone who has a copy (or quick access to a copy) of any of the following books:

• David Rivard, Sugartown (Graywolf)
• Sally Ball, Annis Mirabilis (Barrow Street)
• Wyn Cooper, Postcards from the Interior (BOA)
• Brian Barker, The Animal Gospels (Tupelo)

If this is you, and you're willing to scan and e-mail or fax me a couple pages from the book(s), please contact me ASAP. I'll make it worth your while: I'll send you a free signed copy of one of my books, or, if you have those already (of course you do), two free copies of West Branch.

Please pass this along to anyone you know who might be able to help. Thanks, y'all.

* * * * *

The cold water line to our washing machine has finally thawed! Hooray! No more sharing the laundromat with students! No more T-shirts from the 80s cutting off the circulation in my arms!

* * * * *

I'm still working out every morning on the elliptical machine. Doing my ab crunches and leg lifts and whatnot. Randy says he sees a difference, and I definitely feel better, though I will prolly look like the same old Ron to all y'all when we meet in Atlanta. What's the weather going to be like in Atlanta? Can I wear shorts in March in Atlanta? I haven't been to a decent-sized city in a year. Can you tell I am getting excited about Atlanta?

[photo: zygocactus in bloom, January '07]

CO so not cool

Well the neighbors' pipes froze, so our dolt of a landlady had a kerosene space heater cranked full blast in their part of the basement, which, oddly enough, runs beneath our kitchen (though we can't access it). Result: Randy goes to the emergency room with carbon monoxide poisoning. By the time I saw the message taped to my office door (folks were trying to find me but I was in the library and had forgotten to turn my cell ringer back on) and headed off to the ER with a friend (thanks, D), R had already been released. There's more to the story--after throwing open the doors and windows (it was waaaaaay cold) to air things out, I called the fire department to make sure the apartment was safe for us to sleep in--but the main news is that R is okay. What a scare.

* * * * *
I hope they set Ms. Nowak's bail appropriately high . . . umm, can you say flight risk?

Ba-dump bump tssssh! (Thank you, I'll be here all week.)

* * * * *

(not taking) the Plunge

Bitter cold this weekend, which caused us to wonder how many brave or reckless folks would take the annual Polar Bear Plunge (the Susquehanna is so shallow at Lewisburg that it's more like taking the Wade; one has to wade thirty feet out just to take a good dip in the water). We were amazed to see about 75 folks dash, in small groups, into the river. Much whooping and cheering from the 250 or so townfolk gathered on the bank, bundled tight against the freezing wind. A paramedic unit was parked on the ramp, and blue-uniformed recue workers chatted nonchalantly. A local restaurant offered free hot chocolate to participants. A man in a thickly padded red wetsuit--he looked like a Spandex-encased walrus--stood in the water tied to a heavy rope; he'd stoop every now and then to pluck a chunk of ice from the river and toss it aside with a splash.

Great fun. This was also the weekend for the local ice festival--carved ice sculptures set up along Market Street, with a great big one in Hufnagle Park. At least the ice will keep a while this year: during last year's festival, temperatures were in the forties and the sculptures melted quickly, toppling, forlorn and misshapen, to the sidewalks. [Check out "The Ice Festival," a wonderful poem by Katie Hays in issue 32:1 of the New Orleans Review which is set during last year's festival here in Lewisburg.]

[photos: Polar Bear Plunge, Lewisburg, 2/3/07]

Going!

Well the budget worked out, and I am going to Atlanta. I can't believe it's February already. We met this afternoon with the two delightful student interns who'll help staff the West Branch table at the AWP Book Fair. I just printed out the conference schedule to decide which events I'll try to attend.

Taking home the new issue of Crab Orchard Review to browse this weekend. Browsing, grading, and helping Randy plan out a new quilt design: it's supposed to get mighty cold, so we'll be staying cozy.

Almost six--time to pack up and head out.

Betsy gave me a clementine. I love clementines.

[photo: snow falling on euonymous hedge, 1/28/07]