variations on the epithalamium

I really like this poem by Brenda Shaughnessy. It's called epithalament.

A few years ago, a wrote a few poems that I called "epithalamianagrams." I wrote these for friends who were getting married. The idea was to compose a poem that used only the letters in their names -- to use anagrams to symbolize their marriage. Those poems were incredibly satisfying and fun to write.

Good news

My pamphlet "How Hate Got Hand" is now available from eohippus labs.

Eohippus labs is the project of Amanda Ackerman and Harold Abramowitz, two of the coolest people ever.

Harold has a new e-book out from Little Red Leaves, and Hex Press will be publishing Amanda's chapbook this summer.

Also, the new issue of Little Red Leave is gorgeous and full of really awesome poetry.

Looking forward to Fall

Two of my very favorite people have books coming out this fall: Randa Jarrar and Andrew Porter. I can't wait!

the poem dress and the letter tree

In the dream last night there were many clothes and many dirty clothes. At one point, sequestered in what was my own little attic room in a massive house belonging to my parents, I had to write a poem a day, but I did not have paper and so I had to write these poems on a dress. The dress was a thick blue cotton (almost linen) and I was writing with a blue ball point pen, and so I had to press hard to make the ink flow onto the fabric. I was in a hurry and when the words were not very dark, I thought, "oh, I will be able to read them later, but they will not be what I think they are in this moment," and then I lamented that I am often lazy and rushed if an idea comes to me when I am in the midst of some other activity (or falling asleep) and I imagine (lazily) that I will remember what I was thinking and nothing will be lost. But it always is.

The other part of the dream was that it was before my sister's wedding. Although my sister's wedding was over a month ago, I dream about it often. In the dreams I do not know what to wear or my dress is dirty or there is a second wedding and I can't wear the same dress twice. There is often a closet filled with clothes that no longer fit or are not really appropriate for the occasion. Last night, I was busy unloading a car before the before-the-wedding party. E was there (her wedding is soon) and A and B and C (though they were late). For some reason, even though it wasn't *my* wedding, my mother had asked all my friends to write letters to me. She told them that letters meant more to me than anything else, and so the best thing they could give me would be a letter. My mother had filed all the letters in clear plastic sleeves (page protectors) and strung them in a tree. So the tree by the garage was full of these lovely letters sheathed in plastic and fluttering from their strings.

reading from "a coincidence of wants" / collab w/ drummer chris cogburn

@ dos press reading @ okay mountain in Austin, TX
I talk about the phrase "a coincidence of wants" here

*also* check out Michalle Gould reading from the first Hex Presse chap, Resurrection Party, here.

thanks to Ash Smith for videoing

Reading w. Dos Press

Reading for Dos Press and Hex Presse @ Okay Mountain in Austin on December 1st at 7:00PM.

Michelle Detorie (CA, ed. Hex Presse) will read/perform w/Austin drummer, Chris Cogburn.
Johannes Goransson (Indiana, ed. Action Books)
Michael Cross (Buffalo, ed. Atticus/Finch)
Michalle Gould (Austin, reading from the first book from Hex Presse)

mimicry

a habitat threshed with willows
where a hawk spooled slow
and the yellow disc hovered
as if almost a half-moon
eye over winter-water
switching to where bird-caged
your fingers and your red
hair and how I'd forgotten
until the white bars emerged
composed by marsh grass
and the light was as the light
you reined around you
in the bone-blue of summer
that blue scarf and how
I noticed the bird-call slipped
against the silver coins
as I realized how very long
your hair had grown
since we left