"It's truly hard to tell, in a McCarthy performance, where the
incohate rant stops and the poetry begins. And it's hard to
find the music, the poetic craft, on the page of one of his
chapbooks, either."--Richard Beban
“Aside from the occasional stabs at assonance and consonance
picked up and dropped so quickly they make me think they
were the kind of random typing accidents that happen
when monkeys try Shakespeare, show me the poetry in this piece"—
Richard Beban on one of my poems.
No further comment on the above.
Showing posts with label Richard Beban. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Richard Beban. Show all posts
Sunday, May 5, 2019
Monday, April 23, 2012
More ancient history of SoCal poetry explained for you.
Richard Beban (ex-L.A., currently France) takes the floor, in comments excerpted from a 2003 post to the CobaltPoets Yahoogroups listserve:
When I first came to poetry, nine years ago, I began attending the
Midnight Special workshop, then was asked, with Jeanette Clough, to help
run it and the readings. After a couple of years, and after publishing a
successful anthology, FORESHOCK, we had a falling out with the head of the
series, and we moved on. Five of us from that workshop began the Rose
series, first at Hyperdisc, after Ross Cantalupo ended his series.
I bring this up because, when we left the Midnight Special, I wrote a long
e-mail describing what had happened, and addressed it to the "poetry
community." The best advice I got in response to that e-mail was from
[James] Boomer Maverick, who wrote back and gently chided me, saying that the
Midnight Special reading was one very small twinkling star in the greater
constellation of LA poetry, as I would learn when I looked further.
It was great advice, for which I still thank Boomer. He was right. When
I got beyond my own limited perspective, I saw the multitude of scenes, of
possibilities, of readings, which stretch from San Luis Obispo to San
Diego, from Redondo to Riverside. And we tailored the Hyperdisc/Rose
readings to what we were learning, and to include all those "scenes."
When Kaaren and I set out with three other poet friends, Jeanette Clough,
Jim Natal and Jan Wesley, to create a Los Angeles poetry reading series in
March of 1997, we were seeking answers to a few elusive questions: What
is community? And how does one contribute to it?
The five of us, united only by our love of poetry, which we were all just
beginning to approach as craft, rather than pastime; by age (within five
years of each other, and of 50); and by conspicuous heterosexual
whiteness, wanted to create a reading series that would enhance and
contribute to an explosively heterogeneous poetry community. Los Angeles
was (and remains) home to some of the country's most accomplished writers,
as well as to black-clad poseurs who write their work on cocktail napkins
while waiting for the open mike to free up; to septuagenarians who'd
helped build the scene since The Beats, as well as to talented
high-schoolers; and to poets of enough races, colors, creeds and
persuasions to give Jesse Helms permanent night sweats.
A random sampling of local poets' names read like mail call for a
Hollywood-produced World War II platoon: Albertano, Arroyo, Barresi,
Ben-Hur, Bogen, Byrne, Campos, Cantalupo, Coleman, Cohee, Constantine,
Lafontaine, Lem, Lummis, Lupert, Mullen, Muske, O'Melveny, Quickley, St.
John, Tezcatlipoca, Tran, Uyematsu, Villamil, Weinberger, Woloch, Yamada
and Yates.
And their styles and personae were as different as their names. Gathering
even ten percent of this agglomeration into a coherent reading series
would be like attempting a hummingbird roundup with goldfish nets, but we
five were crazed enough about poetry to hear the potential of all those
wings thrumming in one venue.
We already had a hint of what we didn't want. We had all met in a
workshop and reading series sponsored by a local "leftist" bookstore,
that, despite its egalitarian marketing pose, was really just a fiefdom
for one man who was threatened by sharing power, and whose series rewarded
with featured readings primarily those poets who simply showed up week
after week.
While the workshop environment nurtured some excellent local poets, his
attitudes, selection process, and constant embrace of the new "voices from
the street," regardless of quality, guaranteed that the reading series
would never rise above a certain level of competence, and that the truly
excellent published poets of regional and national stature, whom he
dismissed anyway as elitist "page poets," would never grace the bookstore
during his reign.
Radical as some of our own political leanings might be, we approached
community with a conservative attitude compared to many of our peers: we
respected tradition. We recognized that the rich culture we found in Los
Angeles' poetry Petri dish had not been created parthenogenetically the
week before last, but had been nurtured over the years by hundreds of
diverse practitioners in and out of academia, from Ann Stanford to Charles
Bukowski, from Wanda Coleman to David St. John, from Exene to Stephen
Yenser. We wanted to create a series that would honor, and feature, as
many of the pioneers from the preceding generations as were willing to
read for us, as well as our peers and the best poets we could find of the
upcoming generation.
We wanted a structured open mike that would allow fledgling poets to
discover their voices, and to feel welcome, and would complement the
featured readers, who were the major guests for the evening, and who were
performing, despite their reputations and achievements, always for
audience donations, and whatever they made on book sales (handled for us
by the local independent, Small World Books, or by the poets themselves).
We also hoped to draw touring poets of national reputation, but without a
budget, we didn't hold out much hope of rivaling the reputation of the
now-departed Lannan Foundation reading series, or the Poetry Society of
America's Hollywood/poetry fusion jams at the Chateau Marmont.
All of our ambitions for community found a home at Hyperdisc, a tiny CD
store on Santa Monica's Main Street that had a small stage well away from
the traffic noise, a good p.a., and baristas willing to keep the
cappuccino machine quiet during the featured readers.
In keeping with our notion of hosting without ego-inflation, we five (who
rotated hosting chores each week) began our then-nameless program by
reading a piece by another poet (Jack Gilbert, at our inauguration) whose
work had moved the host, only reading our own work once a year in a joint
featured reading.
Los Angeles native and diva Laurel Ann Bogen, a generous teacher,
organizer and a well-respected poet for over twenty years, headlined our
first reading, our signal that we were honoring those poets who came
before us; but also celebrating that one could have years of chops honed
in books and still remain as kick-ass fresh as the performance poets being
spawned in the streets each day.
Laurel Ann's gracious willingness to headline at our pass-the-hat venue
helped us draw the attention of her working poet peers, and in subsequent
weeks we presented John Harris, whose Papa Bach bookstore had been the
Westside's poetry mecca in the seventies; Michael C. Ford, scuffling buddy
of the seminal LA rock band, The Doors; Holly Prado, Harry Northup and
Cecilia Woloch, part of the influential five-poet LA publishing
collective, Cahuenga Press; Harryette Mullen, UCLA's wordplay poet
extraordinaire; legendary (despite their youth) local teachers Dorothy
Baressi and Eloise Klein Healy; ex-Karma Bum Doug Knott, a Beat-influenced
father of performance poetry, as well as up-and-comers Esteban
Torres-Guzman, Jerry Quickley, Gabe Cousins, Brendan Constantine and Liz
Gonzalez, and poet-publishers Amelie Frank, Matthew Niblock, Marcia Cohee
and Mifanwy Kaiser.
By the time we hit the August heat, with our mid-month double-bill of
Momentum Press founder and Beyond Baroque workshop leader Bill Mohr,
paired with Ellen Sander, the seminal rock journalist and poet, our
series, then in its twenty-fifth week, was gathering steam and renown.
We'd given a podium to more than two hundred open mike poets already, and
were about to showcase our first East Coast headliner, Boston's Jack
McCarthy, an award-winning slam poet whose long, lyric works were also
being published in respected journals.
To wrap up a long story, Hyperdisc went belly up and we continued the
series, as the Hyperpoets, at Venice's Rose Café (which had much better
food and an art gallery) for the next 2 ½ years, realizing all of our
dreams of enriching the local community and its reputation, until we all
decided to call it quits so we could get back to writing.
But in our time we presented hundreds of poets, had publication parties
for Spillway, Rattle, Solo Magazine, Sacred Beverage Press, Cahuenga
Press, The Valley Contemporary Poets, Erica Erdman, Matt Niblock, The
Santa Clarita Valley Poets, David St. John; a benefit readings for Habitat
for Humanity, and raised over $700 one night to try to keep Sisterhood
Bookstore alive.
When Hyperpoets ended, we gave the $1100 or so left over in our kitty (our
small percentage of Small World Book's sales, plus donations we ourselves
had made to Hyperpoets) to an inner-city kids literacy program at which
Jan Wesley taught.
And all we were, Terry, were five poets with a sense of what we'd like
community to look like. So we created it. We DID something.
When I first came to poetry, nine years ago, I began attending the
Midnight Special workshop, then was asked, with Jeanette Clough, to help
run it and the readings. After a couple of years, and after publishing a
successful anthology, FORESHOCK, we had a falling out with the head of the
series, and we moved on. Five of us from that workshop began the Rose
series, first at Hyperdisc, after Ross Cantalupo ended his series.
I bring this up because, when we left the Midnight Special, I wrote a long
e-mail describing what had happened, and addressed it to the "poetry
community." The best advice I got in response to that e-mail was from
[James] Boomer Maverick, who wrote back and gently chided me, saying that the
Midnight Special reading was one very small twinkling star in the greater
constellation of LA poetry, as I would learn when I looked further.
It was great advice, for which I still thank Boomer. He was right. When
I got beyond my own limited perspective, I saw the multitude of scenes, of
possibilities, of readings, which stretch from San Luis Obispo to San
Diego, from Redondo to Riverside. And we tailored the Hyperdisc/Rose
readings to what we were learning, and to include all those "scenes."
When Kaaren and I set out with three other poet friends, Jeanette Clough,
Jim Natal and Jan Wesley, to create a Los Angeles poetry reading series in
March of 1997, we were seeking answers to a few elusive questions: What
is community? And how does one contribute to it?
The five of us, united only by our love of poetry, which we were all just
beginning to approach as craft, rather than pastime; by age (within five
years of each other, and of 50); and by conspicuous heterosexual
whiteness, wanted to create a reading series that would enhance and
contribute to an explosively heterogeneous poetry community. Los Angeles
was (and remains) home to some of the country's most accomplished writers,
as well as to black-clad poseurs who write their work on cocktail napkins
while waiting for the open mike to free up; to septuagenarians who'd
helped build the scene since The Beats, as well as to talented
high-schoolers; and to poets of enough races, colors, creeds and
persuasions to give Jesse Helms permanent night sweats.
A random sampling of local poets' names read like mail call for a
Hollywood-produced World War II platoon: Albertano, Arroyo, Barresi,
Ben-Hur, Bogen, Byrne, Campos, Cantalupo, Coleman, Cohee, Constantine,
Lafontaine, Lem, Lummis, Lupert, Mullen, Muske, O'Melveny, Quickley, St.
John, Tezcatlipoca, Tran, Uyematsu, Villamil, Weinberger, Woloch, Yamada
and Yates.
And their styles and personae were as different as their names. Gathering
even ten percent of this agglomeration into a coherent reading series
would be like attempting a hummingbird roundup with goldfish nets, but we
five were crazed enough about poetry to hear the potential of all those
wings thrumming in one venue.
We already had a hint of what we didn't want. We had all met in a
workshop and reading series sponsored by a local "leftist" bookstore,
that, despite its egalitarian marketing pose, was really just a fiefdom
for one man who was threatened by sharing power, and whose series rewarded
with featured readings primarily those poets who simply showed up week
after week.
While the workshop environment nurtured some excellent local poets, his
attitudes, selection process, and constant embrace of the new "voices from
the street," regardless of quality, guaranteed that the reading series
would never rise above a certain level of competence, and that the truly
excellent published poets of regional and national stature, whom he
dismissed anyway as elitist "page poets," would never grace the bookstore
during his reign.
Radical as some of our own political leanings might be, we approached
community with a conservative attitude compared to many of our peers: we
respected tradition. We recognized that the rich culture we found in Los
Angeles' poetry Petri dish had not been created parthenogenetically the
week before last, but had been nurtured over the years by hundreds of
diverse practitioners in and out of academia, from Ann Stanford to Charles
Bukowski, from Wanda Coleman to David St. John, from Exene to Stephen
Yenser. We wanted to create a series that would honor, and feature, as
many of the pioneers from the preceding generations as were willing to
read for us, as well as our peers and the best poets we could find of the
upcoming generation.
We wanted a structured open mike that would allow fledgling poets to
discover their voices, and to feel welcome, and would complement the
featured readers, who were the major guests for the evening, and who were
performing, despite their reputations and achievements, always for
audience donations, and whatever they made on book sales (handled for us
by the local independent, Small World Books, or by the poets themselves).
We also hoped to draw touring poets of national reputation, but without a
budget, we didn't hold out much hope of rivaling the reputation of the
now-departed Lannan Foundation reading series, or the Poetry Society of
America's Hollywood/poetry fusion jams at the Chateau Marmont.
All of our ambitions for community found a home at Hyperdisc, a tiny CD
store on Santa Monica's Main Street that had a small stage well away from
the traffic noise, a good p.a., and baristas willing to keep the
cappuccino machine quiet during the featured readers.
In keeping with our notion of hosting without ego-inflation, we five (who
rotated hosting chores each week) began our then-nameless program by
reading a piece by another poet (Jack Gilbert, at our inauguration) whose
work had moved the host, only reading our own work once a year in a joint
featured reading.
Los Angeles native and diva Laurel Ann Bogen, a generous teacher,
organizer and a well-respected poet for over twenty years, headlined our
first reading, our signal that we were honoring those poets who came
before us; but also celebrating that one could have years of chops honed
in books and still remain as kick-ass fresh as the performance poets being
spawned in the streets each day.
Laurel Ann's gracious willingness to headline at our pass-the-hat venue
helped us draw the attention of her working poet peers, and in subsequent
weeks we presented John Harris, whose Papa Bach bookstore had been the
Westside's poetry mecca in the seventies; Michael C. Ford, scuffling buddy
of the seminal LA rock band, The Doors; Holly Prado, Harry Northup and
Cecilia Woloch, part of the influential five-poet LA publishing
collective, Cahuenga Press; Harryette Mullen, UCLA's wordplay poet
extraordinaire; legendary (despite their youth) local teachers Dorothy
Baressi and Eloise Klein Healy; ex-Karma Bum Doug Knott, a Beat-influenced
father of performance poetry, as well as up-and-comers Esteban
Torres-Guzman, Jerry Quickley, Gabe Cousins, Brendan Constantine and Liz
Gonzalez, and poet-publishers Amelie Frank, Matthew Niblock, Marcia Cohee
and Mifanwy Kaiser.
By the time we hit the August heat, with our mid-month double-bill of
Momentum Press founder and Beyond Baroque workshop leader Bill Mohr,
paired with Ellen Sander, the seminal rock journalist and poet, our
series, then in its twenty-fifth week, was gathering steam and renown.
We'd given a podium to more than two hundred open mike poets already, and
were about to showcase our first East Coast headliner, Boston's Jack
McCarthy, an award-winning slam poet whose long, lyric works were also
being published in respected journals.
To wrap up a long story, Hyperdisc went belly up and we continued the
series, as the Hyperpoets, at Venice's Rose Café (which had much better
food and an art gallery) for the next 2 ½ years, realizing all of our
dreams of enriching the local community and its reputation, until we all
decided to call it quits so we could get back to writing.
But in our time we presented hundreds of poets, had publication parties
for Spillway, Rattle, Solo Magazine, Sacred Beverage Press, Cahuenga
Press, The Valley Contemporary Poets, Erica Erdman, Matt Niblock, The
Santa Clarita Valley Poets, David St. John; a benefit readings for Habitat
for Humanity, and raised over $700 one night to try to keep Sisterhood
Bookstore alive.
When Hyperpoets ended, we gave the $1100 or so left over in our kitty (our
small percentage of Small World Book's sales, plus donations we ourselves
had made to Hyperpoets) to an inner-city kids literacy program at which
Jan Wesley taught.
And all we were, Terry, were five poets with a sense of what we'd like
community to look like. So we created it. We DID something.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
As I exit the SoCal poetry building, some random items to ponder.
True story: Years ago, I was offered a chance to sit down with then-L.A. Poetry Influence Richard Beban and still-OC Poetry Influence Steve Ramirez and I rejected it out of concern that it was going to be pressure on me to shut my mouth and stop being contrarian about poetry community matters.
True story #2: The other day, after posting my leaving-for-awhile announcement on Facebook, my hater club called TERRY McCARTY'S WAR AGAINST HUMANITY sent this message: http://waragainsthumanity.wordpress.com/2011/11/01/again/
True story #3: In a backchannel conversation between still-L.A. Poetry Influence G. Murray Thomas and myself within the last year, Murray told me [in context of community acceptance] to "write better poetry."
I'd like to think that I've improved aesthetically over the past decade-and-a-third, even if certain people think otherwise and/or are tired of hearing whatever I write, say or think.
And the sad irony is that I started my "career" in poetry keeping my mouth shut, swallowing disappointment and believing (or trying to believe) just about everything the community says is right and proper.
True story #2: The other day, after posting my leaving-for-awhile announcement on Facebook, my hater club called TERRY McCARTY'S WAR AGAINST HUMANITY sent this message: http://waragainsthumanity.wordpress.com/2011/11/01/again/
True story #3: In a backchannel conversation between still-L.A. Poetry Influence G. Murray Thomas and myself within the last year, Murray told me [in context of community acceptance] to "write better poetry."
I'd like to think that I've improved aesthetically over the past decade-and-a-third, even if certain people think otherwise and/or are tired of hearing whatever I write, say or think.
And the sad irony is that I started my "career" in poetry keeping my mouth shut, swallowing disappointment and believing (or trying to believe) just about everything the community says is right and proper.
Friday, April 22, 2011
Here's to the Culture-Shaping Commandos!
I've begun reading the DON'T BLAME THE UGLY MUG anthology--and am busy in absorbing each poem on its own merits (Rick Lupert and Eric Lawson's contributions stand out in a good way at this unfinished point in the journey).
But, unfortunately, I'm a bit troubled by the Victor Infante introduction.
Despite saying some kind (and accurate) words about Steve and Ben's stewardship, it's Victor's tendency to let his occasionally gushing, perhaps occasionally inadvertently condescending Arbiter of Taste flag fly:
"...where some of the brightest stars in poetry today have popped their heads in to read"
"....why so many heavyweights of various poetic stripes are willing to travel to the outskirts of a mid-sized SoCal town to read"
"a little homey community reading" (note for all who read this: "community reading" is poetry code for "tolerant of amateurs")
and here's the passage (highlighted by me) that tells you all you want to know about Victor Infante and his ethos that poetry belongs to Navy Seals of letters, and that baby blue Marines deserve the washout they get:
"And that's the secret to running a reading, and indeed to poetry in general. It's hard, exhausting work--frustrating often and grueling always--but then you get those moments when someone who's never read a poem in public before brings a jaded poetry audience [!] to tears. or when a kid who's been reading for a couple months pops up with something that matches anything the heavyweights have to offer, and suddenly, it's magic."
Safe to say it's the kind of passage written by a human being now used to routine acceptance from publishers/literary journals.
Actually, the combat-unit of literary elites trope isn't something I made up myself. Richard Beban, in the midst of a scolding seven-page letter [!] to me, used that same metaphor--listing poets by their last names: Lupert, Constantine, Arroyo etc. etc.
The reason I'm writing this post has nothing to do with envy: a lot of poets who have survived over the thirteen years I've been involved with SoCal poetry deserve accolades for their work on page/stage.
Instead, it's to make a comment on the post-2003 SoCal poetry environment where people such as (I'll list them by last names) Beban, Thomas, Infante, Brown, Alvarado determine who makes it into the lifeboats in an apparent expression of concern that if poetry culture isn't given the proper shaping for quality (and to discourage and weed out "amateurs"), the potential listening public could choose "wrong."
Therefore, you have a lot of people wielding brooms who are secretly frightened of being swept into obscurity by the brooms of others.
But, unfortunately, I'm a bit troubled by the Victor Infante introduction.
Despite saying some kind (and accurate) words about Steve and Ben's stewardship, it's Victor's tendency to let his occasionally gushing, perhaps occasionally inadvertently condescending Arbiter of Taste flag fly:
"...where some of the brightest stars in poetry today have popped their heads in to read"
"....why so many heavyweights of various poetic stripes are willing to travel to the outskirts of a mid-sized SoCal town to read"
"a little homey community reading" (note for all who read this: "community reading" is poetry code for "tolerant of amateurs")
and here's the passage (highlighted by me) that tells you all you want to know about Victor Infante and his ethos that poetry belongs to Navy Seals of letters, and that baby blue Marines deserve the washout they get:
"And that's the secret to running a reading, and indeed to poetry in general. It's hard, exhausting work--frustrating often and grueling always--but then you get those moments when someone who's never read a poem in public before brings a jaded poetry audience [!] to tears. or when a kid who's been reading for a couple months pops up with something that matches anything the heavyweights have to offer, and suddenly, it's magic."
Safe to say it's the kind of passage written by a human being now used to routine acceptance from publishers/literary journals.
Actually, the combat-unit of literary elites trope isn't something I made up myself. Richard Beban, in the midst of a scolding seven-page letter [!] to me, used that same metaphor--listing poets by their last names: Lupert, Constantine, Arroyo etc. etc.
The reason I'm writing this post has nothing to do with envy: a lot of poets who have survived over the thirteen years I've been involved with SoCal poetry deserve accolades for their work on page/stage.
Instead, it's to make a comment on the post-2003 SoCal poetry environment where people such as (I'll list them by last names) Beban, Thomas, Infante, Brown, Alvarado determine who makes it into the lifeboats in an apparent expression of concern that if poetry culture isn't given the proper shaping for quality (and to discourage and weed out "amateurs"), the potential listening public could choose "wrong."
Therefore, you have a lot of people wielding brooms who are secretly frightened of being swept into obscurity by the brooms of others.
Friday, April 15, 2011
A poetry blast from the past--how some of my cynicism developed.
From an old Cobalt Poets listing in the last decade. Here's Richard Beban, one-time Hyperpoet, talking to Bowerbird Intelligentleman, performance poet, about me. Beban gets in a shot at a poem of mine, that, interestingly enough, was published in the first Tebot Bach anthology SO LUMINOUS THE WILDFLOWERS (highlighting is mine):
Bird:
I'd have to agree with you about it being "certainly no worse
than much of the stuff out there." High praise from you.
Much of the stuff out there is also prosaic polemic, little
angry essays that probably work in high school "satire"
magazines, but bear little resemblance to crafted poetry.
Terry is a PROSE writer, Bird; there's little difference between
one of his angry posts and one of his angry "poems," generally
about failure in Hollywood.
Just because you break a line where you want it, instead of
where the typesetter wants it, that doesn't make you a poet.
It's truly hard to tell, in a McCarthy performance, where the
incohate rant stops and the poetry begins. And it's hard to
find the music, the poetic craft, on the page of one of his
chapbooks, either.
Here's a "list poem" from the Wildflower anthology that's
big on list and small on poem. Gee, it's a satire about
showbiz. Well beat me over the head with a Princeton New
Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics, I hadn't noticed how
deft and brilliant the satire was. (Last sentence satire.)
Aside from the occasional stabs at assonance and consonance
picked up and dropped so quickly they make me think they
were the kind of random typing accidents that happen
when monkeys try Shakespeare, show me the poetry in this piece:
Icarus' Itinerary
Fly high in the sky.
Allow wings to be melted
by the sun.
Fall to Earth.
Suffer painful injuries.
Hire a PR firm to do damage control.
Apologize to Jay, Dave, Conan,
Larry, Connie, lyanla,
Dr. Phil, Barbara and Oprah.
Confess past sins
to a sympathetic journalist.
Do a photo shoot for
VANITY FAIR.
Get a suspended sentence,
contingent on completing
200 hours of community service.
Go to a rehab center in Malibu.
Become clean and sober.
Get a new pair of wings.
Feel immortal.
Repeat all of the above.
> but richard, why do you keep blasting terry's work?
>
> while i haven't heard much of it, what i have heard
> seems to me to be at an acceptable level of quality,
> certainly no worse than much of the stuff out there.
>
> -bowerbird
>
Bird:
I'd have to agree with you about it being "certainly no worse
than much of the stuff out there." High praise from you.
Much of the stuff out there is also prosaic polemic, little
angry essays that probably work in high school "satire"
magazines, but bear little resemblance to crafted poetry.
Terry is a PROSE writer, Bird; there's little difference between
one of his angry posts and one of his angry "poems," generally
about failure in Hollywood.
Just because you break a line where you want it, instead of
where the typesetter wants it, that doesn't make you a poet.
It's truly hard to tell, in a McCarthy performance, where the
incohate rant stops and the poetry begins. And it's hard to
find the music, the poetic craft, on the page of one of his
chapbooks, either.
Here's a "list poem" from the Wildflower anthology that's
big on list and small on poem. Gee, it's a satire about
showbiz. Well beat me over the head with a Princeton New
Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics, I hadn't noticed how
deft and brilliant the satire was. (Last sentence satire.)
Aside from the occasional stabs at assonance and consonance
picked up and dropped so quickly they make me think they
were the kind of random typing accidents that happen
when monkeys try Shakespeare, show me the poetry in this piece:
Icarus' Itinerary
Fly high in the sky.
Allow wings to be melted
by the sun.
Fall to Earth.
Suffer painful injuries.
Hire a PR firm to do damage control.
Apologize to Jay, Dave, Conan,
Larry, Connie, lyanla,
Dr. Phil, Barbara and Oprah.
Confess past sins
to a sympathetic journalist.
Do a photo shoot for
VANITY FAIR.
Get a suspended sentence,
contingent on completing
200 hours of community service.
Go to a rehab center in Malibu.
Become clean and sober.
Get a new pair of wings.
Feel immortal.
Repeat all of the above.
> but richard, why do you keep blasting terry's work?
>
> while i haven't heard much of it, what i have heard
> seems to me to be at an acceptable level of quality,
> certainly no worse than much of the stuff out there.
>
> -bowerbird
>
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Re Chinese comic being silenced by Chinese government.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-china-comedian-20100909,0,2359397.story
Key passage (with highlighting by me): "He says things nobody else would dare to say, especially in the entertainment industry," said Pu Zhiqiang, a lawyer who has criticized Guo's treatment on Twitter. "The government was looking for an excuse to teach him a lesson, to say, 'You should be flattering the government instead of criticizing.'"
Sounds to me like certain portions of the SoCal poetry community.
Key passage (with highlighting by me): "He says things nobody else would dare to say, especially in the entertainment industry," said Pu Zhiqiang, a lawyer who has criticized Guo's treatment on Twitter. "The government was looking for an excuse to teach him a lesson, to say, 'You should be flattering the government instead of criticizing.'"
Sounds to me like certain portions of the SoCal poetry community.
Sunday, July 11, 2010
TOY STORY 3 and poetry communities.
Overall, I loved TOY STORY 3. It's the best movie about the poetry community (particularly in its Sunnydale Day Care scenes) since Terry Zwigoff and Daniel Clowes' ART SCHOOL CONFIDENTIAL.
No matter what city or town you live in, if you're part of a poetry community you've met a few leaders like Lotso Bear (superbly voiced by Ned Beatty). I've met and dealt with at least four Lotsos over the last dozen years.
Interesting quote from Walter Chaw's review of TOY STORY 3 on the filmfreakcentral.net site: "Seduced by the chance to be loved by generations-upon-generations of toddlers, they find a darker truth in a cliquish cabal whose lust for self-preservation at a daycare divided between a room for the older kids who know how to take care of toys and the youngsters who don't has made them bellicose and strange."
No matter what city or town you live in, if you're part of a poetry community you've met a few leaders like Lotso Bear (superbly voiced by Ned Beatty). I've met and dealt with at least four Lotsos over the last dozen years.
Interesting quote from Walter Chaw's review of TOY STORY 3 on the filmfreakcentral.net site: "Seduced by the chance to be loved by generations-upon-generations of toddlers, they find a darker truth in a cliquish cabal whose lust for self-preservation at a daycare divided between a room for the older kids who know how to take care of toys and the youngsters who don't has made them bellicose and strange."
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Monday, February 22, 2010
Being set straight yet again about Los Angeles poetry's desire to keep the herd thinned.
So the Important poet and I have been continuing to e-mail and, among other things, I was reminded that my standards for which poets should get features (a mixture of various types--and sometimes skill levels) aren't correct ones. I would allow too much--the horror, the horror--mediocrity to be put on display.
Along with that axiom, I was reminded that if poets aren't able to get features at venues where, say, Red Hen Press authors, Pushcart Prize winners and RATTLE (or other literary magazine) editors are favored (including most of the remaining "coffeehouse" readings), then it means the poets should write "better."
I know I'm showing my stupidity/naivete/lack of undertanding again, but it seems to me that a big, diverse city like Los Angeles ought to have a more diverse small-reading scene than it does.
But chasing prestige (or being in the presence of it) is paramount with a lot of people now.
And so the poetry scene in Los Angeles will continue to be exclusive and secretsecret--with the late Hyperpoets reading at Venice's Rose Cafe being the template for the high-toned, often too-dry and too-self-consciously "I'm writing TRUE poetry, as any fool can see" artistic desert.
Along with that axiom, I was reminded that if poets aren't able to get features at venues where, say, Red Hen Press authors, Pushcart Prize winners and RATTLE (or other literary magazine) editors are favored (including most of the remaining "coffeehouse" readings), then it means the poets should write "better."
I know I'm showing my stupidity/naivete/lack of undertanding again, but it seems to me that a big, diverse city like Los Angeles ought to have a more diverse small-reading scene than it does.
But chasing prestige (or being in the presence of it) is paramount with a lot of people now.
And so the poetry scene in Los Angeles will continue to be exclusive and secretsecret--with the late Hyperpoets reading at Venice's Rose Cafe being the template for the high-toned, often too-dry and too-self-consciously "I'm writing TRUE poetry, as any fool can see" artistic desert.
Monday, December 21, 2009
A brief summary of the decade in Los Angeles poetry.
In 2000, poetry in L.A. had room for just about everyone who wanted to participate.
As 2010 approaches, the remaining "scene" tends to have both official and unofficial quality controls in terms of the "prestige" readings. With the decline of "independent" bookstores and
coffeehouses, there are fewer "informal" readings. And even some of the remaining coffeehouse readings are now run by hosts that want to import gravitas more than nurture a viable writing community.
Re my current feelings: I'm reminded of BEING JOHN MALKOVICH's scenes where people, after being inside Malkovich's mind, find themselves dumped out alongside a New Jersey expressway.
Monday, October 12, 2009
Statement ot temporary withdrawal from L.A. poetry "community."
From my Facebook wall:
For the rest of the year, withdrawing from active participation in L.A. poetry community (have been alerted I'm not meeting community standards). Will still be supportive of others when possible. Hope to return sometime next year.
Poetry community standards are high in L.A. these days. Recognizing that I'm not sufficiently hip, or tolerant of certain egotistic behavior, or a recipient of a MFA degree, or a proficient-enough example of "craft-conscious writing", I realize it's time for me to find the exit door for awhile. At least in 1998, when I started going to readings here, there was such a thing as inclusiveness, no matter where your skill level was. Now, it appears to me that the approval of local poets has become highly conditional.
For the rest of the year, withdrawing from active participation in L.A. poetry community (have been alerted I'm not meeting community standards). Will still be supportive of others when possible. Hope to return sometime next year.
Poetry community standards are high in L.A. these days. Recognizing that I'm not sufficiently hip, or tolerant of certain egotistic behavior, or a recipient of a MFA degree, or a proficient-enough example of "craft-conscious writing", I realize it's time for me to find the exit door for awhile. At least in 1998, when I started going to readings here, there was such a thing as inclusiveness, no matter where your skill level was. Now, it appears to me that the approval of local poets has become highly conditional.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Eleven lessons I've learned from "the poetry community."
These lessons are a bit like rules of Fight Club (some straight-up, some laced with sarcasm):
1. Don't criticize the poetry community--after all, they're just sensitive-albeit-flawed human beings just like yourself, regardless of how meanspirited their behavior may seem.
2. Don't criticize specific poets in public.
3. Don't criticize specific poets in private--unless you're ultradeferential and are "mature" (i.e. keep comments as neutral as possible).
4. Don't lose your temper at poets and/or venue owners in public. If you do that, you're likely to be banned for years. If you don't care for a certain host or venue, just leave without comment and go home--and stay the hell away from that venue. It's better to make that choice than have it made for you.
5. Don't criticize the poetry community for wanting to exclude poets who don't meet certain quality-control standards. Corollary: Don't criticize poetry venues for deciding to raise standards by de-emphasizing giving first features to developing voices.
6. Don't criticize poetry community critics by poking fun at those who make pronouncements regarding what poetry should "survive"--and don't criticize the poems of poetry critics who have criticized your poetry.
7. Don't criticize poets who think they're community leaders. You're likely to be told that your criticisms aren't valid because you're not a "leader" like they are. Or you're likely to be compared to Joseph McCarthy.
8. Don't criticize poets who stage poetry festivals where the poets invited are limited to close-personal-friends of the host/organizer.
9. Don't get so angry with poets that you waste valuable time criticizing them on their listserves.
10. Don't complain to the poets in the admonition above (or to poet friends of yours or theirs) if you're banned from the poet's listserve and/or reading. Remember, you're on your own. Either mend fences or move on.
11. Remember when you're critical of poets and/or community, you're likely to hear variations of this phrase: IF YOU HAVE PROBLEMS WITH US, THEN IT MUST BE BECAUSE OF YOUR ATTITUDE!
Class dismissed.
1. Don't criticize the poetry community--after all, they're just sensitive-albeit-flawed human beings just like yourself, regardless of how meanspirited their behavior may seem.
2. Don't criticize specific poets in public.
3. Don't criticize specific poets in private--unless you're ultradeferential and are "mature" (i.e. keep comments as neutral as possible).
4. Don't lose your temper at poets and/or venue owners in public. If you do that, you're likely to be banned for years. If you don't care for a certain host or venue, just leave without comment and go home--and stay the hell away from that venue. It's better to make that choice than have it made for you.
5. Don't criticize the poetry community for wanting to exclude poets who don't meet certain quality-control standards. Corollary: Don't criticize poetry venues for deciding to raise standards by de-emphasizing giving first features to developing voices.
6. Don't criticize poetry community critics by poking fun at those who make pronouncements regarding what poetry should "survive"--and don't criticize the poems of poetry critics who have criticized your poetry.
7. Don't criticize poets who think they're community leaders. You're likely to be told that your criticisms aren't valid because you're not a "leader" like they are. Or you're likely to be compared to Joseph McCarthy.
8. Don't criticize poets who stage poetry festivals where the poets invited are limited to close-personal-friends of the host/organizer.
9. Don't get so angry with poets that you waste valuable time criticizing them on their listserves.
10. Don't complain to the poets in the admonition above (or to poet friends of yours or theirs) if you're banned from the poet's listserve and/or reading. Remember, you're on your own. Either mend fences or move on.
11. Remember when you're critical of poets and/or community, you're likely to hear variations of this phrase: IF YOU HAVE PROBLEMS WITH US, THEN IT MUST BE BECAUSE OF YOUR ATTITUDE!
Class dismissed.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
L. A. poet Richard Beban and the Ballona Wetlands--with a little I HEART HUCKABEES on the side.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CobaltPoets/message/14244
[Relevant passages of the above message from Mr. Beban:
I am delighted to tell you that I have been hired as the co-Executive Directorof the non-profit Friends of Ballona Wetlands <http://www.ballonafriends.org/>,L.A.'s preeminent wetlands education and preservation group. The Friends havebeen working for thirty-one years to save and restore the last remaining coastal wetlands acreage in L.A. County, and educate the public about the importance of wetlands in our world ecosystem.
Other groups have Ballona in their name (in fact, one of them, definitely trying to sow confusion,is run by the same people who tried unsuccessfully to SHUT DOWN a marvelous wetlands poetry event Kaaren Kitchell and I ran in 2003 because it didn't toe their political party line), but we're the Friends of Ballona Wetlands.
Why tell poets all this? Because the Friends will be offering poetry reading and publication opportunities in the very near future (mostly at the usual non-profit rates, of course), so e-mail me [address deleted] if you have environmentally themed work.]
http://www.ballonafriends.org/
http://www.socal.com/absolutenm/templates/?a=5632
http://www.metro.net/news_info/archives/2003/04_April/mta_051.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballona_Wetlands
http://www.allmovie.com/work/the-last-stand-the-struggle-for-the-ballona-wetlands-216293
http://www.argonautnewspaper.com/articles/2008/08/07/news_-_features/top_stories/2bal.txt
http://www.ballona.org/Content.aspx?page=3&sub=5
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/apr2003/2003-04-21-03.asp
http://www.calcoast.org/news/wetlands091803.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Heart_Huckabees
http://www.alternet.org/environment/16006/greenwashing_coastal_development/
Pay special attention to the final link above.
[Relevant passages of the above message from Mr. Beban:
I am delighted to tell you that I have been hired as the co-Executive Directorof the non-profit Friends of Ballona Wetlands <http://www.ballonafriends.org/>,L.A.'s preeminent wetlands education and preservation group. The Friends havebeen working for thirty-one years to save and restore the last remaining coastal wetlands acreage in L.A. County, and educate the public about the importance of wetlands in our world ecosystem.
Other groups have Ballona in their name (in fact, one of them, definitely trying to sow confusion,is run by the same people who tried unsuccessfully to SHUT DOWN a marvelous wetlands poetry event Kaaren Kitchell and I ran in 2003 because it didn't toe their political party line), but we're the Friends of Ballona Wetlands.
Why tell poets all this? Because the Friends will be offering poetry reading and publication opportunities in the very near future (mostly at the usual non-profit rates, of course), so e-mail me [address deleted] if you have environmentally themed work.]
http://www.ballonafriends.org/
http://www.socal.com/absolutenm/templates/?a=5632
http://www.metro.net/news_info/archives/2003/04_April/mta_051.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballona_Wetlands
http://www.allmovie.com/work/the-last-stand-the-struggle-for-the-ballona-wetlands-216293
http://www.argonautnewspaper.com/articles/2008/08/07/news_-_features/top_stories/2bal.txt
http://www.ballona.org/Content.aspx?page=3&sub=5
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/apr2003/2003-04-21-03.asp
http://www.calcoast.org/news/wetlands091803.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Heart_Huckabees
http://www.alternet.org/environment/16006/greenwashing_coastal_development/
Pay special attention to the final link above.
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