A poetry-related comment akin to "loose lips sink ships."

A poet said this to me in the midst of a difference of opinion between the two of us:  "I dedicate my work in the community to lifting boats, not sinking them."

And it says something about the desire of many in the poetry community to have people on the same page in public on poetic standards and the importance of following hierarchy to the letter.

But if most people agree on not allowing dissenting uttered-in-public opinions (just noticed a Facebook poetry discussion group where you can "exercise beauty and celebrate free speech" once you're approved to join by its moderator, who also cautions "don't be a dick") it's difficult to parse the logic that the temple of Poetry Community is so fragile that disagreement on certain subjects by the few, or the one, will cause the temple to collapse and crumble.

In short, the boat of Majority Opinion will always float--regardless of what other people may tell you.

Link to Glenn Kenny blog post ("How Do You Think It Feels") that's worth reading.

Whether or not you know the writings of film critic/blogger Glenn Kenny (who used to write for the now-defunct US version of PREMIERE magazine and is now a contributor to Roger Ebert's website rogerebert.com), this is a really worthwhile, thoughtful piece where Kenny examines past animosities towards some of his peers and his efforts to make amends.

Some sentences that resonate for me:
I also had some idea that it was my duty to call bullshit on everyone who I thought was propagating bullshit.

I can still be fairly intemperate, online, in person, wherever. Every day I try to be better about it, to use my wits, such as they are, for constructive purposes. But I’m in no position to pat myself on the back. I am in a position to state that my past behavior, of which my nasty baiting of Emily Gould was only a small part, cost me, and it cost me across the board, in terms of reputation, professional and personal, and other things that you can probably guess. And I earned the cost.

When you’re a drunk, and have some facility for words, and things aren’t going so great for you, you can read something and infer that the writer’s situation is better than your own, and it can throw you into a frothing bloody rage. You think, “Why is the world paying attention to this NOBODY?” or “why is this NOBODY making more money than I am?” and “why isn’t this NOBODY beset with paralyzing depression and fear like he or she deserves to be instead of me?” and so on, and then because you fancy yourself a critic or a perspicacious observer of the cultural scene, you mold these resentments into a theory that there is something VERY WRONG with the culture and that the person you hate is the one responsible for that thing being very wrong.

http://somecamerunning.typepad.com/some_came_running/2014/06/how-do-you-think-it-feels.html

Speaking for myself, I'm not quite in the place Glenn Kenny has been.  My (as Kenny would put it) "resentments and disappointments" haven't been fueled by alcohol, since I don't drink.  They've been formed from observation and personal experience.  And, akin to Kenny's relationship to East Coast literary/journalistic peers, I've been guilty of finding certain men and women now and formerly in the Southern California poetry community to be poster children for vanity, ill-treatment-of-others-professionally-personally, egotism and public boorishness.  In certain cases, my opinion of some of these people may never change.  But I do have to grudgingly accept that I have unnecessarily alienated several people in the community that extended some degree of friendship/graciousness towards me.

Having admitted this, I also need to state how difficult it is for me to make amends or be permanently forgiving when certain people in the poetry community either created or cheered on an anonymous website meant to goad and humiliate me--plus harassing me into ceasing the blog you're reading now.  That's not "community" behavior, no matter how one might justify it.  Instead, it's the equivalent of the scene in the original CAPE FEAR (1962), where Gregory Peck crouches behind a dumpster to watch two men (hired by him) beat up the threatening, villainous-in-many-ways character played by Robert Mitchum.

The present conundrum for me is to figure out how to speak out (when I feel occasions demand it) about unnecessary inequity, dubious behavior and diminishing opportunities in the LA/OC/LBC community without adding my name to more Enemies Lists.  In a way, this approaches the rigor of balancing equations in high school Chemistry.

If you've been following me on this blog (or when I contributed to various listserves), hopefully you believe that my level of vitriol has decreased markedly over the past decade.

If not, please use the comment section to speak up--using your own name.

RIP Eli Wallach.

Two clips from Eli Wallach's performance, as Tuco in Sergio Leone's THE GOOD,  THE BAD AND THE UGLY (1967):
http://youtu.be/AApIyQK-vEQ
http://youtu.be/meP_Ufwj-FY

Wallach and Marilyn Monroe in THE MISFITS (1961), written by Arthur Miller and directed by John Huston: http://youtu.be/_e917WJMzl4

Wallach receiving his honorary Oscar at the 2010 Governors' Awards:
http://youtu.be/N37u6BuN0MA

John Waters explains why there are no more John Waters movies.

The  eternally subversive filmmaker/essayist/author in an excerpt from an INDIEWIRE interview with  Nigel M. Smith:
Smith: In the best that could happen portion, a fan loans you five million dollars to make a new film. Is money what's holding you back from following up "A Dirty Shame"?

 

Waters: Yes. It's not just me. David Lynch hasn’t made a film in years.

They all want it to cost under a million dollars and I’m not doing that. I can’t do that anymore. I can’t go backwards. I don’t want to be a faux underground filmmaker. I have no desire to do that. I like writing books just as much as making movies. They pay better these days. It’s not so different from a movie. You got the character, you have the plot. The difference is you don’t have to worry about how much it’s going to cost. And you can sell it to the movies [laughs].

The full interview, where Waters discusses his new book CARSICK, can be found here:

http://www.indiewire.com/article/john-waters-on-hitchhiking-across-america-for-carsick-i-think-my-street-cred-went-up-20140624?utm_campaign=Wildfire+Message+-+John+Waters+on+hitchhiking+across+America+for...&utm_content=po_1247360&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter

Another true poetry story.

As I listen to the Steve Baratta tribute on KillRadio.org, I can't help but remember this  brief anecdote:
Steve didn't get a lot of features at  LA area poetry venues, regrettably, in the era when many more of them existed.  And there was one time when a then-Big host of a well-attended venue offered him a feature--and then reneged on his promise.

Apparently, the host's ego and hubris mattered more than showing respect and support to Steve--who was a loyal venue regular.

To paraphrase Joni Mitchell said in "Big Yellow Taxi", we don't know (or realize) what we have until it's too late.

Eight mostly obscure Guilty Pleasure movies.

Check YouTube and/or IMDB for further information and possible clips.

In no specific order:
1. BUNNY O'HARE (1971)--Bette Davis and Ernest Borgnine as aging bank robbers who disguise themselves as hippies to pull off jobs in the Southwest.
2. THE MANITOU (1978)--One of the great unintended comedy classics, with Susan Strasberg as a woman with a mysterious growth on her neck, which turns out to be something Evil.  Also starring Tony Curtis, Ann Sothern and Michael Ansara.
3. THE INDESTRUCTIBLE MAN (1956)--Lon Chaney, Jr. as criminal "The Butcher" brought back to life by electricity.  Partially filmed in the old Bunker Hill neighborhood of Downtown Los Angeles. 
4. A BULLET FOR PRETTY BOY (1970)--American International-released, 1930s-period gangster film with Fabian (billed as "Fabian Forte") as Charles Arthur "Pretty Boy" Floyd.
5. SWITCHBLADE SISTERS (1975)--From cult director Jack Hill (best known for the Pam Grier films COFFY and FOXY BROWN), a lively drive-in film about a female gang.  Features the great line "It's gonna be baaaaaad."  Rescued from oblivion by Quentin Tarantino during his Rolling Thunder reissue period (aided by Miramax).
6. BUCK ROGERS IN THE 25TH CENTURY (1979)--The pilot for the campy (only during its first season) NBC/Universal sci-fi series with Gil Gerard, Erin Gray and Pamela Hensley, given a brief theatrical release a few months before its telecast--with some mildly risqué dialogue ("I'm freezing my ball bearings off"--Twiki the robot) added to ensure a PG rating.
7. WHITE COMANCHE (1968)--Spanish/German Western with William Shatner in the title role.
8. GUNS OF A STRANGER (1973)--Western with occasional song interludes starring Marty Robbins as The Drifter, with supporting cast including veteran Chill Wills and Dovie Beams--the latter known for being the mistress of the late Philippines dictator Ferdinand Marcos.

A quintessential Steve Baratta poem: FOR EVERY SOUL.

Linking to this 2010 poem from the late Steve Baratta's blog:
http://stevebaratta2.wordpress.com/2014/06/07/for-every-soul/

When poets use friendship with other poets as excuse to punish poets.

In a way, my ongoing Ugly Mug banishment (and my various--sometimes pleas for forgiveness, sometimes open irritation at the situation stretching out for years) could be compared to the principal's office scene in John Hughes' THE BREAKFAST CLUB where principal Paul Gleason and student Judd Nelson keep at each other, ensuring that the web of anger and recrimination becomes as hard as iron.

Given the two-dimensional definition of me (by the Two Idiots Peddling Poetry and certain friends of theirs as a highly unpleasant person who doesn't write "good" poetry), there are times when I don't care whether I ever return to Orange CA--except to, perhaps, go window shopping in the old-neighborhood downtown area.

On some level, the hosts and the owner probably know that I learned my lesson from the unfortunate outburst of almost a decade ago and wouldn't misbehave and/or be disrespectful at the venue.

But, as has been made clear to me by one of the hosts in recent years, it's less about what I mentioned in the previous paragraph and more to do with what I write on this blog (before that, on certain listserves).  And, apparently, beyond the wish that I don't write anything critical of the reading or the hosts, lays the edict that I can never enter the Ugly Mug again because I have caused offense to friends of theirs.  This offense has been due to written words of mine (some of which I would never write again; others, I would restate in a more thoughtful, considerate--but still dissenting--way).

Ideally, even someone like me should be able to attend any kind of poetry reading as long as I'm not verbally or physically threatening to anyone--and quiet and respectful to the hosts, features and open-mike poets while they are on the podium.

It's understandable that people get hurt and have reflexive reactions if they feel their friends are being regarded unfairly.  But, as long as the disputed conduct exists far away from the venue, no poet should have a reason to feel wary of even outcast poets.

In the SoCal poetry community, banishment should not be used as a tool to silence unpopular speech that happens in other areas than poetry venues.

Most local poets will stand up for causes national and worldwide.  Just not (alas) how the power given to poetry hosts by reading attendance (and money given to features and venue owners) can be sometimes wielded in a less than poetic fashion.