st*rnosedmole

Saturday, May 22, 2004

Here, have an old quasi-translation...

Summertime



		After Osip Mandelstam





What a summer! Young workmen,

Tatars, walk out with their girls

Filling the parks at evening

With brawny arms and cotton skirts

	And their little brass keys	

			Hello! Hello!



They call, they respond, they turn

Down the walks like dancers

In a minuet. And who knows? Tonight,

Some might even change partners

	Batting their long lashes

			One-two and one-two.

posted by Reen |link| ...talkety...0 comments

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Friday, May 21, 2004

Depress yourself with this photo tour of poets' graves. Will you have an imposing tomb, an unmarked burial, or the unique anticlimax of a Standard American Tombstone, with your last name chiseled upon it in the exact same font they use for the signs announcing office parks? I myself possess a photo of Shelley's grave, with a very self-satisfied calico cat sleeping upon it. The Protestant Cemetery in Rome is awash in cats. In fact, they have two donation boxes at the entrance: one for upkeep, one for cats.

posted by Reen |link| ...talkety...0 comments

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Huzzah Haiku

Amid rejections,
an acceptance. Fresh wind blowing
over the thorns.

posted by Reen |link| ...talkety...0 comments

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Thursday, May 20, 2004

Yesterday was a day of moping about poetry. Mope mope mope.

Today is a day of good poetry news. Good good good.

I will keep reading the Jumbo poem. It also pleases me.

posted by Reen |link| ...talkety...0 comments

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Wednesday, May 19, 2004

Back from C-Ville, and a bad day at work. Frustration-Land. Usually my frustration comes from other people's errors; today it was my own, although other people helped me make it. Sigh.

Not much poetry got done over the weekend. I brought copies of Novelty Act, Calamity, and the still-really-rough Vocative down to show to Mark, but we ended up playing croquet and video games instead of editing. I came up with a bunch of great titles, though, one of which is lifted from the signs they put on the parking meters in Alexandria, Virginia:

ALL MAY PARK, ALL MUST PAY.

Others to look out for: "Biotech Baby," "Friday Attitude on Monday Morning," "The Queen of It Ain't Nothing Atoll," and "Third Among Equals."