Mindy Nettifee shares her GLITTER IN THE BLOOD with other poets.

Somehow, in spite of a distinguished career as a page-and-stage dynamo, former LBC/OC powerhouse Mindy Nettifee is still referred to as a "rising" poet--such are the ways of modern poetry communities.

For those who may be interested, Mindy has a writing-poetry-better-tips book (from Write Bloody) called GLITTER IN THE BLOOD.

Here's the purchase link: http://www.amazon.com/Glitter-Blood-Manifesto-Better-Writing/dp/1938912012/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1354777282&sr=1-2&keywords=mindy+nettifee

Here's the blurb from Amazon.com:

You do not want to write good poems. You want to write great poems. You want to write poems that challenge, inspire and awe. You want to write poems that forever alter your audience, that forever alter yourself. Those poems take guts. Glitter in the Blood: A Poet's Manifesto to Better, Braver Writing will put you in constant contact with your guts. Pushcart prize nominated and highly accomplished performance poet Mindy Nettifee is not going to lead you step-by-step up a how-to staircase. With this collection of essays, prompts and exercises, Mindy is giving you the wrench you need to open up the blood and let it flow into your writing.

 

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Recent Mindy Nettifee online radio interview.

In the interest of offering a sort of "equal time"--here's an interview with Mindy Nettifee
on the BreakThru Radio show WRITER'S BLOCK:
Here's a clip of the show: http://snd.sc/j0vb9s


Here's a link to the entire program: http://bit.ly/ksYf7B

My humbling continues: LBC poetry icon Mindy Nettifee teaches me that actions have consequences by unfriending me on Facebook.

Crying soft tears today; Long Beach-based, Orange County-blessed poet Mindy Nettifee unfriended me from Facebook.

It probably didn't help when I wrote a poem last year called I'LL BE YOUR DEAD MAN FOR THE EVENING (look it up in the archives here) that was an account of how uncomfortable I felt during the portion of one Lightbulb Mouth (a now-dead reading/"show") event I attended in Long Beach last June.  Mindy and Derrick Brown (Write Bloody small press publishing majordomo) were the engines driving Lightbulb Mouth.

And it probably didn't help even more when I wrote her backchannel at a later time and made the mistake of criticizing a Long Beach Icon she holds dear to this day.

But I can understand.  If you're Mindy Nettifee and you've accomplished quite a lot locally and nationwide as a poet and promoter, you're not going to want to hear from someone who, by stark contrast, can seem like a sorehead and a loser who just doesn't know how to be nice to nice people.

So the moral I've living with is that of the time-honored cliche: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all."

In the LA/OC poetry communities, you can quadruple that.

Mindy Nettifee, dinosaurs and the future of a virtual coffee house reading.

Last night, my wife and I logged on to Coffee Cartel (in Redondo Beach) by way of this website:
http://www.blogtv.com/people/diogenesclub which webcasts the Tuesday night poetry reading from roughly 7:30 to after 10:00 p.m.

Mindy Nettifee, last night's featured poet, referred to coffee house readings as "dinosaurs" in her opening remarks. Whether or not one agrees with Mindy, it's clear that attendance for at least some L.A.-area readings aren't what they used to be.

I would hope that the stay-at-home folks who used to be poetry regulars in, say, the 90s and early 00s might tune in to the Redondo Poets reading at the site above each Tuesday night if they wish to be supportive of virtual coffee house poetry.

To be truthful, the sound quality of the webcasts could use some improvement. But it's an opportunity to see the Larry Colker-chosen features and open-mike participants live and in-the-moment.

And that's an experience which should be spared dinosaur-like extinction from audience indifference/nonsupport.

A modest proposal re Long Beach's Lightbulb Mouth reading.

Awhile back, I wrote a poem called I'LL BE YOUR DEAD MAN FOR THE EVENING--inspired in part by not being able to make it past the open-mike section of the Lightbulb Mouth "poetry show" in Long Beach run by Derrick (Write Bloody publisher/entrepreneur) Brown and Mindy Nettiffee each Wednesday.

Here's a thought: As far as Lightbulb is concerned, perhaps the gesture of an open reading should be dropped--and they should concentrate on being a showcase-only venue for friends and nationally-known colleagues. And, if Mindy and Derrick desire a nonpoet-but-still-afficionado audience [as was explained to me backchannel by a supporter of the reading], perhaps they should try print ads in the LA and OC WEEKLY and expand their current base (although that requires money and some risk).