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]

Lovely, fleeting--

We had a bit of snow yesterday. I took pics as I walked home at dusk: Bucknell Hall (the Stadler Center for Poetry) looks all warm and toasty (though it's really all cold and drafty upstairs). No one had walked the railroad tracks yet. So hushed. So lovely. I'm ready for more.

Kudos--

--to Teresa Leo, whose manuscript, "The Halo Rule," was just selected by Sarah Kennedy for the Editor's Prize at Elixir Press. Watch for this book!

* * * * *
Off to my 1:00 class--

Burlesque Betsy

Pal Betsy Wheeler is reading tonight at the Bar Rouge in Dupont Circle (that's D.C., y'all). Click here for the blog on the whole reading series.

* * * * *

Kitchen Magician

That would be Randy. But today I helped with a project: we have an eclectic collection of cookbooks and pottery on two bookcases in the corner of the kitchen, and this morning Randy decided we should thin down the cookbooks to fit the shelf above the sink. Good idea! We were left with a box of cookbooks to store in the attic until we can yard sale them this spring. We washed all the pottery--and my too-many teapots--and rearranged them. Much nicer. (R's still in the kitchen. I have homework to grade and a lesson plan to finish.)

* * * * *
He just found me a spider: a small one, yellow-green, moving fast. I flicked it into a bowl and carried it up to the terrarium. (The aphids are still a problem. I tried a half-strength solution of rubbing alcohol, but it didn't seem to faze them. Maybe I didn't saturate them enough. I decided to continue my pursuit of non-chemical methods.)

* * * * *
I may not go to Atlanta for AWP. This has me a little bummed. We were counting on some travel funds that turned out to be about half the amount we expected. I need to go shake some money trees. At least next year's conference (if I'm still doing this sort of thing) will be in New York, only a three-hour drive.

* * * * *
Here's another poem that I read in class last week. (I keep a file of "daily poems" to read in class, and another one of "teaching poems.") I realized, as I was reading the "pallbearer" section, that the poem had come to mind because of the "disappearing twin" syndrome that Deirdre and I were chatting about two weeks ago.

THE BEAUTY OF YOUTH

Is reinvention. My son, chameleon-like,
is someone else every day — Spiderman
in makeshift leggings, Gina Lollabrigida
in my red heels. He isn't fixed
on gender, on the living or the dead,
fictive or real, evil or saintly. I let him be
Mussolini for a day. How much harm
could he do, with little time, no reinforcements?
When he is God he learns it's lonely
at the top, and hard to recall
all his addled sisters' demands.
As Ponce de Leon, he lacks
experience, is disinterested in the fountain of youth.
One day he is his twin brother.
Even I can't tell them apart.
The next day he finds a spot
on the warm slate floor
and barely moves. Who are you?
I ask. I'm a pallbearer, he says,
missing his twin. He is practicing
for his next incarnation: a stone,
which he has learned in school
can be halved and halved and halved
without pain, in rain and heat
and still cling to its purest properties.

: Andrea Cohen, in Provincetown Arts, v.18 (2004)

* * * * *
[photo: fence backlit by holiday lights, 1/12/07]

WTF?

How effing strange to see this poet on Jeopardy! tonight.

Reading weekend

This weekend I'm reading and thinking about Dorothy Allison's story "River of Names," which I'd never read before, for my intro CW classes. Looking forward to our discussions. Also reading the first batch of applications for the June Seminar. And (and!) I received the first set of proofs for West Branch 60, our 30th anniversary issue. Everything's due on Monday. It's a heavy reading weekend. I think I'll go to the office for part of the day.

* * * * *
It finally got cold here. My office window rattles. We've had snow flurries, but nothing's really stuck yet.

* * * * *
I'm gradually increasing my daily workout. It's going well: I have more energy, fewer headaches, and a heightened--what to call it?--clarity. My black jeans fit! And I've lost six pounds so far.

* * * * *
Continuing my practice of reading a poem each day in class, I started off with one of my favorites:

The Revolution

Robinson Crusoe breaks a plate on his way out,
and hesitates over the pieces. The ship begins
to sink as he sweeps them up. Sets the table
and stands looking at history for the last time.
Knowing precision will leak from him
however well he learns the weather or vegetation,
and despite the cunning of his hands.
His mind can survive only among the furniture.
Amid the primary colors of the island, he will
become a fine thing, perhaps, but a different one.

: Jack Gilbert, Monolithos (1982)

* * * * *
Hillary Clinton is in. Are we ready for a woman to lead the country? (I know I am.)

* * * * *
[photo: Bucknell at night: Roberts Hall]

Silly busses

Tweaking mine again before classes begin tomorrow, at which point they (the syllabi) become set in virtual stone.

I need to walk a new path home this evening, just to check out the classroom accommodations (I hear it's a nice room but I've never taught in this particular building before).

Goodbye, leisure! Goodbye, novels! We'll meet again come summer . . .

* * * * *
On my bookcase today, I found a cup containing curdled milky tea. It was disgusting.

* * * * *
"Whenever I visit the seacoast, I derive pleasure just knowing that several feet beneath my waterproof boots lies an animal quite possibly 90 years my senior, silently finishing a supper of diatoms and algae inhaled through its meter long neck."

--David George Gordon, Field Guide to the Geoduck

Okay. I had never heard of geoducks before. The word is pronounced like "gooey ducks." My friend Deirdre mentioned them today. They're clams. They have huge long necks. They burrow about three feet down and then settle there for, like, a hundred years. And they look like penises. Giant, slimy penises.

Gooey ducks, indeed.

[photo: campus at night - just outside my building]

Dark news

What is up with all the dead birds? First Austin, then this story out of Australia. Scary.

* * * * *
Just received my copy of Rigoberto Gonzalez's Butterfly Boy: looking forward to reading it.

* * * * *
Last week my dad's sister died. Mom hung up from the call and the phone rang again with the news that her own sister had also died. What are the odds of something like that?

* * * * *
This poem has been on my mind:

MY DEAD FRIENDS

I have begun,
when I'm weary and can't decide an answer to a bewildering question

to ask my dead friends for their opinion
and the answer is often immediate and clear.

Should I take the job? Move to the city? Should I try to conceive a child
in my middle age?

They stand in unison shaking their heads and smiling--whatever leads
to joy, the always answer,

to more life and less worry. I look into the vase where Billy's ashes were--
it's green in there, a green vase,

and I ask Billy if I should return the difficult phone call, and he says, yes.
Billy's already gone through the frightening door,

whatever he says I'll do.

- Marie Howe, What the Living Do

[photo: campus call box light]

Scoop

Congratulations to Jill Allyn Rosser, whose manuscript has just won the New Criterion Poetry Prize! Jill's first book, Bright Moves, won the Morse Poetry Prize; her second book, Misery Prefigured, won the Crab Orchard Award. She's a marvelously accomplished poet--her poem "The Brain of the World" is smart, complex, and memorable, as are many of the images in her work. Not a semester goes by that I don’t read “Lover Release Agreement” and “Patience Is a Virtue” to my students: both are excellent villanelles, contemporary in their setting and tone but with language that makes a conscious nod toward the tradition of the form.

* * * * *
My copy of Pebble Lake Review arrived yesterday. Nice to see my work in good company. Thanks again, Amanda and crew.

* * * * *
We bought an elliptical machine. I've lost four pounds (as of yesterday morning). My goal is to shed enough to create a Mini Me so I can attend twice as many events in New York at next year's AWP. (I'll be the one that does not resemble a pile of chicken fat.)

* * * * *
If you have tried to reach me via my campus e-mail, try again with my Gmail. Bucknell's junk filter is still randomly sucking "good" e-mails into detention space, where I may or may not find them.

* * * * *
It's dark. It's cold. It's time to go home. Randy's making soup for dinner. I can hardly wait.

[photo: night campus, 12/27/06]

Rolling with da Betty Wheel

Drove down to Harrisburg yesterday morning to pick up Betsy at the train station. I was hoping she'd brought along some good old midwestern snow, but so far there's been none, and temps continue to be freakishly warm. Anywho, B & I had a great chat on the way home (it's only an hour's drive) and stopped for lunch at Mya's, which has been nicely renovated (they had a fire last year). Hope you've been enjoying Betsy's poems this week over at No Tell Motel!

* * * * *
Last week, we watched a perfectly tepid Meryl Streep film: Before and After. Flaccid dialogue, lackluster performances from Streep, Liam Neeson, and Alfred Molina--you could almost see them cringe after delivering some of the truly lame lines--and the actor who played the troubled son was utterly annoying. This film came out in 1996. I've sprinkled a few of Meryl Streep's films into my Netflix waitlist--I generally *love* her work--but I can find absolutely nothing in this film to recommend it.

* * * * *
My hosta seedlings are up, and coming along well under lights in the attic. They started sprouting about three weeks ago. I still have lots of seed, gathered from our own plants and from a nice stand of giant white-flowered plants on campus near my office building. I started more seeds on the 31st: dwarf columbines and spider plants.

* * * * *
The terrarium is overrun by aphids. In November, I planted a few small cuttings of Kenilworth ivy, a beautiful creeping plant that grows in rocky crevices (I always notice it along the base of some of the old buildings in town, for example, and there are always several nice trailing clumps growing out of the mortar between the stones that support the railroad trestle near campus) and sports tiny pale violet blooms. A week or two later, I noticed a couple of aphids. That's all it takes, really: by the time you see 'em, they've got a foothold and some kind of action is necessary. As luck would have it, our chemistry building was swarmed that same week by ladybugs--it was another freakishly warm day in mid-November, and I noticed the ladybugs crawling all over the sidewalk and brick, so I caught two and brought them home.

At first they just sat there in the terrarium, clinging to the nearest leaf and doing pretty much nothing. Next day, I noticed that they were climbing all over the plants, and within a week I couldn't see a single aphid. This got me worrying about what to feed the ladybugs, which seemed to be hitting it off well: Randy actually filmed them making acrobatic ladybug love as they clung to a leaf. (Imagine two humping Volkswagen Beetles.)

It's been almost a month since I last saw them. Maybe they're hibernating? At any rate, the aphids are now in full assault, sucking on every leaf of the Kenilworth ivy, which has spread considerably. I don't think I can let this go much further without using some insecticidal soap. If I could find some other insect predator, I'd go that route first, though. Spiders, maybe?
* * * * *
[photo: hosta seedlings, three weeks old]

Square-in-square

I'm grateful for these quiet days at home: reading, thinking, quilting. Here's the simple Square-in-Square mini quilt top I pieced over the weekend of the 24th: nothing too elaborate, my first attempt at foundation piecing, and though one of the rows is off-center, I still think it's not bad. On Saturday I started piecing a new mini in the "Hourglass" pattern--very tiny pieces, and it's slow work to keep them precisely square, but I did finish two blocks (with eighteen to go) and I'm hoping to complete the whole thing by this weekend. Meanwhile, I spend at least an hour each evening on a long-term project that's a surprise: I'm still hoping to complete it within two years (which translates to this August, so we'll see).

* * * * *
On Friday, I met P for coffee and we reviewed the final order for West Branch #60, which will feature a novel excerpt by Pablo Medina, an essay on Charles Wright by David Swerdlow, stories by Ted Delaney and Rebecca Barry, poems by John Kinsella, Nancy Eimers, John Gallaher, Danielle Deulen, Peter Waldor, William Olsen and Nikola Madzirov (translated from the Macedonian), and reviews by Matthew Ladd and Sarah Kennedy.

* * * * *
It's perhaps interesting to note that I have been to Pickwick Dam, the birthplace of Charles Wright, because Randy grew up not far from there--in Adamsville, Tennessee. We visited R's parents--once--and stayed in a rental cabin.

How odd (I thought then) that a poet should arise from this place, or that Martins Ferry, Ohio should produce a James Wright. I stopped in Martins Ferry once, years ago, and asked at the visitors center if they could direct me to Wright's home. The girl at the counter asked "Who?" Sad, really, because the street on which her building was located was named after him. I pointed this out. "Yeah, I dunno what that's about," she replied vaguely, and off I went in search of the local library, where an enthusiastic middle-aged librarian chatted on and on about Wright and his poetry.

Of course (I know now) the librarian was gay. I wish (now) that I'd recognized this and stayed to chat longer.

* * * * *
Thanks, Sebastian, for the surprise phone call!

* * * * *
Happy New Year, everyone.

Whole cloth (1)

Here's a photo I took in September of the whole-cloth quilt Randy had just started. This is the center medallion: you can see the pencil-marked design (the lower right side shows the grid has not yet been quilted). More photos to follow.

* * * * *
Last night I dreamed I had a conversation with Anne Sexton. She wore a black turtleneck and looked fabulous, and her voice was somehow a cross between Judy Garland (slightly quavering, hopeful) and Lauren Bacall (husky survivor). I don't remember what she had to say.

* * * * *
The other night I finished reading Send Me, a novel by Patrick Ryan: a thoroughly engaging book from start to finish. I highly recommend it. You can read a (tepid) review by David Thomson for the New York Review here (Thomson carps about how young-looking Ryan's jacket photo makes him appear, and compares him unfavorably--and endlessly--to Faulkner).

Not so happy with A Scarecrow's Bible (by Martin Hyatt): for starters, it's riddled with typos, one on nearly every page. I actually got out my red pen and started marking corrections, thinking I would just send the whole book back to Suspect Thoughts Press and recommend they hire a better proofreader. (It's a shame, really, because I love what they're doing for queer publishing--I just wish the books were better edited.) But I couldn't get interested in the story, and in the end it felt like proofing someone's endless creative thesis. I gave up. Free copy here to anyone who'll pay the postage.

No camera--

--when I need it: walking to campus yesterday, I saw a white squirrel. It scampered unhurriedly across the lawn, onto a hemlock branch, and then up an oak. Not pure white, but rather a pale gray shading to white (darker at "the roots"). Almost thirty years ago, in Bowling Green, Kentucky, I was at a conference at Western Kentucky University. My second day there, I got up early for my walk, and saw two pure white squirrels among the boulders and trees. When I mentioned them, some folks from the university said the squirrels were campus legends (something about a genetics professor having accidentally released them years before).

* * * * *
I need to photograph the mini quilt top I made over the weekend: a simple paper-pieced pattern, my first attempt at foundation piecing. I stuck it on the flannel wall upstairs on Sunday and forgot to take photos on Monday. When I happened to see it on the wall on Monday night, it was a pleasant surprise: there's nothing like walking away from a project for a while to gain a fresh perspective. It doesn't look half-bad.

Tonight, Randy completed his first commissioned quilt, a cute blue-and-yellow boy's quilt. I cut strips, joined them, folded and pressed them into binding fabric. Just got started putting it on. Hope to have it done by Saturday so we can take the finished quilt to Verna's in Mifflinburg. (Verna was showing off Randy's last quilt--a whole-cloth quilt--in November, when a woman in the store asked Randy if he'd quilt her blue-and-yellow one.) I'm very proud of him.

Domesticity

Quiet Saturday, unusually warm. I'm not through grading yet, but I'm taking at least half the day off: doing laundry, catching up with a few blogs (nice beard, Charlie!) . . .

Highlight of the afternoon: I'm going to try foundation piecing (paper piecing) a miniature quilt. I'm an idiot with technical instructions and can't easily visualize a two-dimensional decription into three dimensions, but I've read through the process (like, fifteen times over the past month) and I think I have it figured out.
* * * * *
Virgil Goode is a jackass. And Virginia scares me more than Texas.

* * * * *
[photo: storm over Bucknell, 12/1/06]

late hydrangea

Just a photo I took in mid-November: though spotted and clearly not long for this world, the hydrangea seemed to glow from within.

Solstice Blessings--

--to all, as we turn into the winter months. I've been waking from difficult dreams, dreams of conflict and trauma: an administrative figure who challenges my teaching and threatens to fire me, a mall robbery somewhere in Asia (?) during which someone literally shoots my head off. I know this is all about transformation, one stage of which may involve the physical tearing apart of the body (at least symbolically). I lean into it, into this period of loss & adjustment, hoping it opens space for some kind of gain.
* * * * *

Poignant visit with my parents in Cincinnati. The weather, peculiarly warm, allowed me the chance to prune Mom's roses (I planted a row of assorted roses along their driveway fence a few years ago and some have grown rather huge) and a wisteria on the back fence. Shopping with Mom at the fabric store (whee!) and Half Price Books (which I truly miss), and canasta games in the kitchen (I lost $26; we checked the score sheets and I haven't won a game since I think 2003).
* * * * *

Randy got bad news while I was away: his sister died in Louisiana. It wasn't entirely unexpected, but that's hardly a comfort when such things come to pass.
* * * * *

Back home: grading final portfolios and catching up with West Branch. This is the time to send me work, folks. Query me [ron dot mohring at gmail dot com] if you have any questions about that.
* * * * *

[photo taken at Dale's Ridge near Lewisburg]

Off to Cincinnati--

--for a long-awaited visit with my family. I'll be without Internet access all week, and will return home on Sunday.

Last gasp

Student conferences all week: folks are coming out of the woodwork to request last-gasp meetings to review a clutch of poems before turning them in on Monday in their final portfolios. Next semester I am going to require two conferences--one before midterm, one after--so that I see everyone face-to-face, but I'm also going to limit each conference to 25 minutes. (No, we can't look at everything today. Yes, we can schedule another short meeting.)

Maybe I need to re-think the whole notion of a final portfolio, and instead grade revisions as we move through the semester. But I love the portfolio, the chance for students to polish and present the best of what they've written, and the self-assessment (which I used to have them write three times--week one, midterm, and again at the end). I always have visions of the students collaborating on a chapbook-type anthology, but I've never taken the leap to implement this project. Maybe this next semester is my chance to really push the envelope and take even more risks with my teaching.

* * * * *

I deleted some recent posts. I hated taking them down, but academia is not, alas, the land of the free (speech).