guide for the perplexed

There is THE Guide for the Perplexed, by Maimonides (12th c, philosophical tract in epistolary format), and also a 2001 novel A Guide for the Perplexed, science fiction by Gilad Atzmon. That's a lot of perplexity - both in Hebrew to boot, although The Guide was originally written in Arabic.

page from a 14th century mss of the Guide

There's your factoid du jour. Back to picnic, workshop & plog: I rearranged sidebar element to put sections about picnic, workshop & purpose of plog closer to the top. The section on what the plog does between picnic is banished to the bottom of the sidebar until after the picnic.

What is the plog? See description on sidebar. Short version: it's a poetry blog in between picnics but also during if I feel like it and need the break. The plog supplements picnic and workshop, but more than just that, it's also my poetry blog. Not everything on it is about picnic or workshop. More during these next months. Less thereafter.

Features: check out the sidebar to the right for links (NM poets & poetry, sunflowers, Mountainair), archives of past posts (click arrow next to year or month for list of links to past posts), "poetry in the news" feature, subscription/bookmarking tools, and - at the bottom of the page - a video clip bar featuring "poetry writing."

Sidebar features are subject to change. Posts range from pwp/workshop updates to poems, annotated resource links, poetry sites, poetry related pieces , oddities (humor, poetry generators & anytime I can find it - the downright weird) and more. Expect to see Savage Chickens on a regular basis, Requests invited.

Poetry idea engine

Comment feature: please use it for questions, corrections, additions, commentaries, reactions, poet/poetry requests & so on. Blogs are Web 2.0 - that means interactive, so interact already. Unless a matter of secrecy or confidential exchange, I'd rather you post in comments instead of emailing me privately. One comment could lead to answering the same question many times at one fell swoop.

Submissions: I am always happy to publish guest posts, poetry news, poems and relevant pictures. You already know editors edit and prune - ruthlessly if need be. Ready to post as sent or nearly so is always appreciated. So are links. Please no image files larger than 100 kbs, pdf files or docx files. No fancy formatting either - it rarely transfers well. I prefer rtf or even plain text files to .doc files because those are full of Microsoft junk code. Max simplicity: just copy/paste to or type it out in your email compose screen.

Expect me to reject attachments over 1 MB with request for resizing, reformatting or file conversion before re-submitting - and still grumble about attachments over 200 kbs. Needless to say, anything that requires file conversion, photo editing, reformatting or researching (often for links to embed) will take longer to process and publish.

blogging through

Time to start pwp posts ... not in the mood for post writing. When blocked, turn to graphics. Plogging, it's hard to beat the amazing savage chickens on poetry matters and the amazing Poet-Bot. Soon enough tomorrow or even the day after.

Diabolical keyboards too. Then there is the "retreat factor" ... most especially after any day of being too much in the world.

And then there are ... poetry generators... to fall back on...

• The Goth-O-Matic^TM awaits your fevered imagination
• Poetry CreatOR 2 (Java applet)
• Rob's Amazing Poem Generator Creates poems from web sites. Try major news sites, for example.

Picnic 2009 reader lineup

The 2009 PWP lineup and writing workshop are shaping up. Dale Harris is hostess, mc, organizer, head cat-herder, whatever as usual - adding singing, workshop coordinating and teaching to the list. Ken Gurney (founder and former editor of Origami Condom) joins Dale as co-mc. For the workshop, Gary Glazner (currently Managing Director of the Bowery Poetry Club, NYC), also reading, joins workshop faculty. “Staff” sounds like clerking or cleaning up after poets, but “faculty” does not sound quite right either - too academic. I'm open to suggestions for another name.

through the gate & into the garden of poets

Readings open with writing workshop participants performing their group workshop poem, created from consecutive verses from individual poems written on same (workshop) theme read in alternating rounds. Last years theme and title was "This town is... this is my town," for the greater part about Mountainair, making the group poem a Mountainair mini-epic. A short open mic session follows group, leading into featured readers. Additional open mic time will be scheduled during the picnic.

Excerpt from “This Town” (Susan Paquet, Workshop 2008)

In this town

You might see
A pair of thousand dollar cowboy boots with a
Trophy blond hanging like a puppy on his side

You might hear
Janglin spurs scratching up a brand new maroon SUV

But he ain’t from here
Mountainair got real cowboys

This is my town.

To date, individual 2009 featured readers (with only a few confirmations MIA) are Dale (time - hers - permitting & hopefully reading "Manzano Sunflowers," her iconic Sunflower Festival / Picnic poem), Ken Gurney, Gary Glazner, Jim Fish, Tamra Hays, Kate Horsley, Lisa Gill, Mitch Rayes, Gary Brower and Nancy Costea. Updates as we go along...

Each year, PWP hosts a poetry writing group that performs as a group. NM Word Weavers (Karin Bradberry, Elaine Schwartz, Merimee Moffitt, Kate Padilla, Sylvia Ramos, Chandra Bales) weave their words for us this year. And don't forget the music: NM Celtic Singers, LuLu (Lou Blackwell and Greg Candela) - and any poet showing up with guitar or accompanist. Here’s hoping for Michael Hays with oud,

Children's Sunflower Art Project on display:

construction paper sunflowers in a storefront window

Manzano Sunflowers

You missed Indian Market
And of course the sunflowers.
As usual they swept across August
At first a few, a yellow trickle along the fence line
Then more, making pools in the pasture
And splashing down into the arroyo
Then incredibly many more,
Dappling the distance,
As though a giant hand had buttered the land.

Yet with the entire prairie to expand into,
They prefer crowds of themselves
They mass along the roadside,
Lined up as though a parade were about to pass.
Here and there one stands alone,
But not for long.
Soon his kin will come
And there will be sunflower squalor
There will be sunflower squalor, a floral slum.

Once they are out,
They will not be ignored.
Stretching their skinny stalks,
They top our roofline,
Press against the window screens,
And peep in at the door.
Familiar foot paths to the out buildings are obscured,
And from the road we seem afloat,
Our cabin, an odd tin boat
In a sea of sunflower faces.

They are the most staccato of flowers.
I catch them humming snatches of polkas
And John Phillips Sousa Marches,
Bobbing in the wind to the Boogaloo,
The Boogie Woogie and the Lindy Hop.
I call their names,
Clem, Clarissa, Sarah Jane
To try and tame them.

My neighbor comes by.
She has a field full
They’re useless, she complains.
Her horses can’t eat them.
I should hope not! I exclaim,
After she’s gone.

I don’t remember if you even liked sunflowers
But you liked life
And they are all about that.
Today I wrote to your family, finally.
I expect they are occupying themselves,
With beautiful gestures
In order to get over the grief of you.
As for me, I have sunflowers.

Dale Harris

and more sunflower poems….

Slam Poet Laureate finals Saturday June 13

Originally posted by Zachary Kluckman to the abqslam group:

Come on out and watch us make history for a meager $12 this Saturday at the Kimo Theater, starting at 6:30, Seating is reserved so get your seats soon and save on service charges by visting the Kimo Box Office. Let's show the city exactly how much we love our poets and the arts in the 505!

KiMo Theater

With a staggering list of spoken word artists, masters of their craft and encompassing NM's insanely rich slam history and poetic heritage, past and present, the event promise a brilliant display of verbal fireworks. The last 12 poets standing will take their craft and performance to audience and judges to determine which one will take the title - the world's first and only Slam Poet Laureate, chosen by the people and recognized by the Mayor and the City of Albuquerque.

With a huge prize package and the honor of wearing this title for the first time, it's all on the line for the following poets emerging from the first rounds:

• Jessica Lopez
• Danny Solis
• Manuel Gonzalez
• Tracey Pontani
• Adan Baca
• Damien Flores
• Rich Boucher
• Hakim Bellamy
• Carlos Contreras
• Jimmy Lusero
• Sina Aurelia Soul
• Christian Drake

Plus performances by Zachary Kluckman with Alana Grier & Rio Duende, Faylita Hicks, Def Poet Idris Goodwin and more!

We're not just making history, we're getting ready to change the face of poetry and bring spoken word back to the people! Be there for what will definitely be the slam of the decade as we appoint the "world's first Slam Poet Laureate" … history – happens now!

click to view larger image

Tickets for the finals show are on sale through Ticketmaster or by visiting the Kimo Theater Box Office in person if you want to avoid the handling charges. Please visit NM Poetry Tangents for more info and details or call (505) 908-4987.

Ed. Note: although billed as a competition to determine the "first and only Slam Poet Laureate in history," I must respectfully point out that Basque poets have, been doing something comparable under a different name and possibly more challenging for centuries: the Bertsolari Txapelketa, the national championship of bertsolaritza, the improvised contest poetry from Basque oral tradition

Poem: Traffic

from Portrait and Dream: New and Selected, published by Coffee House Press. Cross posted from the Academy of American Poets, "Poem-A-Day" feature. Read more about this book.

Traffic
by Bill Berkson

Choice is painful,
Occasion but a drag.

Poems are made by poets,
That's no lie.

"What's wrong with this town,"
A New York driver says,

"There's too much art—and
Too many art lovers!"

"You an artist?"
"Nah, I just drive cab."

New York as topos for a Mountainair poetry blog post? What could I be thinking? There's the obvious: "it's my plog & I can publish what I want," the less obvious: dss chapters on urban poets & cityscapes in poetry, and even the relevant - a connection to the August 22 Poets & Writers Picnic (plog raison d'être)

Gary Glazner, NM poet with Willard roots, featured reader & workshop guest instructor (but presuably not the one running Melbourne pubs) calls New Yorker home these days as Managing Director of the Bowery Poetry Club.

As for NYC and poetry (that is why we are here, isn't it?), there's Whitman, Crane, Moore, Mayakovsky, Ashberry et altria. The Brooklyn Bridge as poetry landmark For Spanish (& Spanglish) speakers, there are the Nuyorican poets writing in Spanish, English and the full macaronic spectrum in between.

More New York City in poetry

• New York Notes by Harvey Shapiro
• Mannahatta by Walt Whitman
• The Lower East Side of Manhattan by Victor Hernández Cruz
• September 1, 1939 by HW Auden
• "Calles y sueños" (from Poeta en Nueva York) by Lorca

from THE LAND/an art site

click to view larger version