Lit Bits-11/12/2014 Stanley Kunitz

Aleathia says:

Stanley Kunitz was born in Worcester, MA in 1905 and died in NYC in 2006.  Over his 101 years he graduated summa cum laude from Harvard in 1926.  He published 12 collections of poetry, several collected interviews and essays, and was the editor or translator for 5 books.

Kunitz is a winner of the National Book Award for Poetry, the National Medal of the Arts, the Bollingen Prize, the Robert Frost Medal, and Harvard's Centennial Medal.

Today I would like to share with you a poem by Stanley Kunitz called "The Snakes of September":

The Snakes of September

All summer I heard them

rustling in the shrubbery,

outracing me from tier

to tier in my garden, 

a whisper among the viburnums,

a signal flashed from the hedgerow,

a shadow pulsing

in the barberry thicket.

Now that the nights are chill

and the annuals spent,

I should have thought them gone,

in a torpor of blood

slipped to the nether world

before the sickle frost.

Not so.  In the deceptive balm

of noon, as if defiant of the curse 

that spoiled another garden,

these two appear on show

through a narrow slit

in the dense green brocade

of a north-country spruce,

dangling head-down, entwined

in a brazen love-knot.

I put out my hand and stroke 

the fine, dry grit of their skins.

After all,

we are partners in this land,

co-signers of a covenant.

At my touch the wild

braid of creation

trembles.

Let's Go Somewhere-11/11/2014 Washington, DC The Wall

Aleathia says:

As a child most of my life was estranged from my father.  I don't know the particular details as the stories my mother told me are different from my father's, but in the end the same feelings resulted.  I spent a lifetime looking out the window waiting for him.  I knew he would come for me.  When I was 10 years old we happened to live in the same town.  We saw each other nearly every day.  He taught me so many things that are still valid and useful to me today.  I cherish those 2 years we had by each other's side.  They were the best two years of my childhood.

When I was 11 he wanted to take me to Washington, DC for Memorial Day.  He is a proud Marine who served in Vietnam and came home to disrespect and hostility.  I always wanted to understand what it was like to be in the war;  I wanted to know because I thought it would make us closer, but he never talked about it.  As an adult, I understand on some small degree that what he must have seen, heard, done, and felt were beyond any comprehension to someone not active in duty.

We took a bus to Washington, DC and got there in the middle of the night...in a rain storm.  We had no hotel reservation, no phone number to find my Uncle Kit, and no place to go.  We walked for miles stopping at each hotel to see if a room was available and several hotel clerks felt sorry for me and let us rest on the couch (sitting up) in the lobby for a little while.  We finally reached the center of the city in the early hours of the morning.  We still had no place to go so we stopped at a park bench and I remember being able to see the White House from that spot.  I slept while my father stayed up to guard me and our stuff.

I woke in the morning to a different understanding of the world.  That day we found my Uncle Kit and stayed at his hotel room.  We went to the wall and I wept at the sight of all those names carved into stone.  All those loved ones lost.  I was thankful at that moment to have been born.  It could have never been.

If you get a chance to see the Wall you must go.  It will crush you and make you proud and give you a monumental understanding of the loss our men gave to serve our country.

Thank you to all the men in my family that have served in the military.  RIP Uncle Kit.  I miss you.

Quills and Frills-11/8/2014 November PAD Challenge

Aleathia says:

I have been distracted from this blog recently.  The dang holidays, work, conflicting schedules, and chores will really do that to a gal.  I am on the verge of completing a major project at work that has been slurping up most of my time and then my blogging world will get back to normal...well, as normal as we get around these parts.

I came home from a long night at work this morning and saw in my Facebook feed that it was day 8 of the November Poem A Day Challenge at Robert Lee Brewer's Writer's Digest page, Poetic Asides. I have to tell you that I have never met Robert Brewer but last November's challenge helped me overcome the death of my cousin, my aunt, and several other friends and co-workers.  His April challenge helped me mourn the death of my mother.  So how in heaven's name did I miss that it was November already?  I think I should refer to the first paragraph.

So if you see this man's face in your Facebook feed:

Click on the link and have a go at the prompt of the day and write a poem that you might not have written otherwise.  It takes some time to get used to writing from prompts, but after several challenges I find that it pulls from me a different perspective about the words I use and helps to open the mental field and encompass much more than my own private garden of thoughts.

The first 8 days prompts are as follows:

1. game over

2. together again

3. blanket

4. (two for tuesday) super hero and super heroine

5. "keep this_____"

6. happy now

7. compulsion

8. blind

When I don't officially participate in the challenge (ie post my poem to his comments at the website) I like to keep a list and cross off topics as the poems come to me.  Approach it however you like.  It is meant to foster creativity and to keep you writing.

I will leave you with my version of a "blanket" poem:

Eiderdown

He covers my eyes

with a blanket

of his secret memories

it is thick

and soft

and warm

I suffocate

trapped

in the carbon

die   ox   ide

of my jealousy

such a life

such a heraldry

I could never

measure up to

I am

but a

shadow

in

history.

Aleathia Drehmer 2014

Lit Bits - 11/5/14 Durable Goods

And the prodigal Joe makes a glorious appearance!

A recent discovery threw me back on The Forked Road. I’ve spent the summer and fall free of social media, and with that came my absence from my contributions here (alas, some distant Friday from now, part two of a never-finished series on biological art will rear its head). I had always intended to return here once I finished my current book, but here I am now:

While cleaning up around our room, my lovely and beautiful girlfriend rediscovered my collection of Durable Goods microzines. For those not in the know, Durable Goods was a bi-weekly bit of poetry and literature that was created by our very own Aleathia. Printed and hand-cut and hand-folded and mailed out, all by her. It was a bittersweet rediscovery. The work in the little booklets are great, and each came with a lovely card with an inspirational quote handwritten by Alea. I even appeared in issue 45 with a little prose poem titled “Piano Girl”; three or four years later, I still don’t hate it (a considerable achievement). Still, something wasn’t quite right…

Of the two dozenish zines graciously sent to me, only five had been opened.

Out of nowhere, I had a stack of unopened Durable Goods running from the 40's to the final issue, 68. I was simply shocked: how could I have simply tossed these aside without even opening them? I’m a mail fiend! I tear into whatever postage remotely has my name on it (I share a name with my father; companies don’t always get the memo). It was, and still is, highly disturbing to me that I so blatantly disregarded these wonderful bits, precious gifts.

In the past hour, I’ve gone and opened every single zine; read each handwritten note; made a nice, neat stack in numeric order; and placed them gently in a small plastic bin on my mantle to be read, then better stored, in the near future. I then immediately sat down to write this.

As a Lovecraftian aficionado, nothing quite stimulates me like finding lost, obscure texts. I decided to share this on Lit Bits day for the perspective of this being a wholly exciting discovery: new poetry to read, more work to internalize, cannibalize! What wonders await me! I only regret not having been privy to Durable Goods at its inception, to have the complete collection.

Now, alas, I don’t feel I deserve it anyways.

Pushing my self-woe aside, I'll now take the time to applaud Aleathia for everything she does, and has done. I'm glad to be back on the Road.

Let's Go Somewhere- 11/4/2014 Rochester, NY's East End

Aleathia says:

When traveling to new and bigger cities from our little slice of podunk heaven it is often hard to figure out where to stay without getting raped, mugged, or killed.  It is also hard to find said places without emptying out the bank account as well.

Rochester, NY is a city with some heavy crime areas, but there are also some beautiful and well kept areas as well.  We went up there this weekend to see a show at The Main Street Armory.  The area north of this venue seemed a bit hairy so I decided to check Zillow to see what the real estate market is like for the city.  This is a great tool when you aren't buying a house because it gives you median incomes, crime rates, and locations of interest in that neighborhood.  This was exactly what we needed.

We stayed at The Strathallan Doubletree in the East End.  This is an unassuming hotel on the outside that is nestled in streets lined with old brick and Victorian mansions.  The inside of this hotel is gorgeous and modern.  They give you free cookies when you check in and the staff were very helpful with ideas for restaurants and bars.  They even arranged for us to have a free shuttle ride to the venue and pick up if the show was out before 11 pm.

On our drive to Rochester, NY we stopped in a suburb called Brighton for a quick and delicious lunch at our favorite burger joint, Tom Wahl's.  This location of the restaurant was much cleaner and the staff were more friendly than the one in Canandaigua and it is right off the highway so it was easy off and easy on.

We were too early for check in still and decided to take a stroll around the Memorial Art Gallery which was only a block from our hotel.  This is a gorgeous old building that reminded me of the Toledo Art Gallery in its dimensions and viewing rooms.  This particular museum had it's quirks. The front desk staff were a bit snooty and some were a bit brash, but the guards wandering around the viewing rooms were very pleasant and informative.  I won't go in to detail about the exhibits we saw there as I will share them on Friday in the Art Bomb section, so look for it!

After checking in to the hotel and relaxing a few minutes, we walked two blocks on East Ave and came to Alexander Street.  There are a great number of places to eat and drink in this little 4 block section.  There are two Irish pubs, Murphy's Law and McGregor's, as well as a traditional British Pub called The Old Toad.  There are several hipster looking bars/restaurants called One, Mex, and Vinyl. If you are down for some quick eats they also have a local pizza place as well as a Subway.

We settled on Murphy's Law.  We had a few pints of Guinness and then some local brewed IPA to go with our Loaded Nachos.  They have a traditional bar food menu, but also have some full entrees if you desire.  They have daily drink specials as well.  After the show, we liked this bar so much that we returned and stayed until about closing which is 2 am.  They have a nice selection of beers, liquor, and Irish Whiskeys.  We had one we had never heard of before called Teeling.  It was quite amazing and went down smooth....too smooth.

We had wanted to go to The Old Toad for dinner, but they weren't open when we walked by so we missed out.  I'm sure we will go next time as I have a hankering for a traditional fish 'n chips.

On our way out of the city, the hotel clerk was nice enough to point us to a cute coffee shop called Starry Nights on University Ave.  They have good strong coffee and delicious fresh baked items. They do offer some gluten free options as well.  It is a cozy corner shop in a nice, quaint neighborhood.

If you make it up to Rochester, NY the East End is a great place to stay.  If nothing else you will enjoy the rich and beautiful architecture of this city's East End.  There are several other museums and places of interest that we hope to see next time we make it up there.  Have fun!

Music Monday-11/3/2014 Primus and the Chocolate Factory

Aleathia says:

Last night we ventured north to Rochester, NY to see Primus....again.  This is our third time in the last 2 years and this was our second show this year.  If you grew up in the late 80's and early 90's you would have loved songs like "Jerry was a Racecar Driver", "Tommy the Cat", and "Winona's Big Brown Beaver".  They have many more great songs, but that era is what sticks with those of us who grew up with it.

So why see them so many times?  Primus is an amazing group with a following not unlike Phish or Grateful Dead only with a more mixed age group of people and not as many stinky hippies.  There is a cult following that love to have their chests vibrated by Les Claypool's bass and listen to the way this three piece group makes such a large and thundering sound.

The special deal this tour is their interpretation on Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory songs that appear in the movie.  Who doesn't LOVE this movie? Who didn't grow up wanting to be Charlie and find the Golden Ticket?  This tour is an insane mixture of Primus with the Fungi Ensemble which adds Cello and Vibraphone to the mix of bass, drums, and guitar.  I can't tell you how incredible this sounded live.

They played for over 3 hours with the first set being regular Primus fare and the second set was all Willy Wonka.  The set and light show added tremendously to this heartwarming fun trip down memory lane.  They even had Oompa Loompas with over-sized heads that ran onto the stage and danced from time to time.

The Main Street Armory isn't the best venue to see a show in as they can hold over 6,000 people with little to no place to sit if you need to and only two bathrooms.  They do have their own internal bar which makes it nice.  The down side is that after an hour or so the people start smoking inside and the ventilation is a little weak.  All that aside, I would probably still see another show there if it came to it.  It was located near the East End neighborhood which was very easy to get around and safe.


Here is a sample of what you would hear if you went to a show:

The best souvenir that we brought home was this smashing good poster from Drew Millward of the UK.  Each show gets its own poster by a new artist each show.  We happened to luck out with the best one of the tour so far.

There are still many dates left on the tour so if they come near your town and aren't sold out already I suggest you get your ass to see them.  You won't be disappointed.

Quills and Frills - 11/1/2014 - A poem

Ally says:

Dog Eared

Impatient in both life and death

I dog ear the books.

As a collector of bookmarks

this drives my husband nuts.

The library books are one thing, he says

making allowances

but not ours.

Yet I find I’m always grabbing

the poetry books off the shelf and forgetting

a bookmark and beside

these sleek slender volumes

can barely hold their own words

let alone a whole bookmark.

So I dog ear,

the little bent corners

of the pages.

Sometimes nothing for whole chunks.

Sometimes one every other poem

after a quick read between subway transfers,

the corners flapping

like flags marking depots

across the dry cold waste of undiscovered land.

I wonder if later

when I’m gone

he’ll find these creases

in the books we shared

the corners still creased

rising now

my long distance death defying reminder

like a star winking at him

all the way from the past,

a message over time

a little salute and a hello

from the darkest corner of space.