(via micha*lcox dot com)


9.
proof for hronir loops
fish crawling spoor noticing waltz loops

follow off plush rot
sculpt an oblong rainbow loops
cloud appalling adult's octopus twistboards
borg sorg hum act · sciamachy loops

fjord and cold
squall Grinchus curb cyborg figuring myrrh loops


"Twelve Democrats crossed party lines to vote for the bill. One Republican, Senator Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, voted against it."


"We live the time that a match flickers; we pop the cork of a ginger-beer bottle, and the earthquake swallows us on the instant." --St*v*nson

"...any place is good enough to live a life in, while it is only in a few, and those highly favored, that we can pass a few hours agreeably." --Rob*rt Louis St*v*nson


8.
myrrhmurmuring has burning
Mothman cyst
trustworthy crystal thought smirk
mutiny fragrant am ruinous

orchid nightclub put
again short
rains ash obsidian a brisk and missing
indigo ogham smog gob

stoop whist mystic nabob possibility
scuttling by


"My 6-year-old daughterelephant could have painted that!"

(via saturn dot jpl do nasa dot gov)


"The major sport of the Middle Ages was war, with its adjuncts the tournament, the joust, and the judicial duel. War had its open and closed seasons dependent upon conditions of climate and upon the great Festivals of Christmas, Easter, and Ascension, even its attempts at quiet week-ends in the Truce of God, and the right of private war was the most valued of the sporting privileges of the mediaeval barons..." --Charl*s Hom*r Haskins, Studi*s in M*dia*val Cultur* (c. 1929)


7.
dark torn thousands convicts rigors sloop of cloud
dormant Ogpu silkworm pools
all twinkling twistboards
road of acrostic atoms rains scour

knoll swarm clouds
glory obsidian slash twistboards
on this scoriac path in addict whorl spool
which torn God shards scour

6.
arousal lull · birth victim · gulf fnast
twistboards brain and catacombs has · hazaj fnast

swimming · curb
glory logic fnast

Umbrist spur · amongst pallid
folk fulvous doff · squids its logic fnast

gaunt jumpsuits swimming many
storp firm fnast

this ruinous infant light's · convolutions
Grinchus chaos fnast



"I was particularly struck by the comparison to Dutch."



"According to Yaqut, the compiler of a biographical dictionary in the thirteenth century, when Buhturi recited his poetry, 'he used to walk up and down the room, backwards and forwards, and he shook his head and shoulders, stretched his arm out and shouted: "Beautiful, by God!" and he attacked his audience, calling out to them, "Why do you not applaud?" ' " --Night & Hors*s & th* D*s*rt

"On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their hearts’ desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron." --H L M*nck*n, according to Phil Rockstroh (via wood_s lot)

5.

rain torn a
nightclub child's wouldn't squall · gulls throughout
this dull light · all things running along brain thin
immortal glory

obsidian slash portal
rain torn now
twinkling hist'ry starts affadavit victim
knoll functioning Miniron at orb


"Besides, such a crowd of well-meaning, amiable, most respectable men have broken down of late years the pales of Parnassus, and become squatters on the sacred mount, that the claim of poets to be a peculiar people is getting disallowed." --Smith


For*ign Bab*s in B*ijing.


On my victrola- Oum Kalthoum

"and if I ever lose my eyes
I won't have to cry no more"

-Cat St*v*ns


4.
storm child polyps don't
impair scrum thrifty silkworm
blackouts adamant

spool commission slag know sport
anything adumbrating


"...The gold
hides in the ground

the way tomorrow's weather
hides in the air,

the way what I will finally know
hides in me now."

--Rob*rt K*lly

Lost Book of 3nki.

"break room linoleum
the dead cricket now
part of the decor"

--Dov* Linkhorn


3.
squall Uqbar ruinous constantly

blindfold claw furl squid
oblong run
lapwing across crisply mutiny final
angular pools rub Asgard

sculpt loss folks is today rasp
insight stunt
slag cyborg who all with instant odds
of claim flown idiocy schism that wallops

twinkling affliction
ruck frost a psychic
squamous autopsy simply


"A man reaches his limits as to thought long before he reaches his limits as to expression; and a haunting suspicion of this is one of the peculiar bitters of the literary life." --Al*xand*r Smith


M*di*val Cats.

    "Whenever a famous movie actor, director or producer passes away, it makes front page news.  Sometimes a screenwriter's death also makes headlines.  On the other hand, it's rare when the passing of other eminent film industry professionals attracts much media attention.  All this is a roundabout way of saying that many of you might not be aware that Sven Nykvist, one of the true giants in the field of cinematography, has died.  For film aficionados across the globe, this is discouraging news indeed, though we still have Nykvist's incredible body of work to remind us of his talent.
    In his illustrious career, Nykvist was most widely celebrated for his collaborations with Swedish director Ingmar Bergman and won Academy awards for 1973's "Cries and Whsipers" and 1983's "Fanny and Alexander." Nykvist's resume also includes films for American directors such as Woody Allen ("Another Woman"), Philip Kaufman ("The Unbearable Lightness of Being") and Bob Rafelson (the 1981 remake of "The Postman Always Rings Twice").  Additonally, he teamed up with fellow Swede Lasse Hallstrom for the Texas based "What's Eating Gilbert Grape."

 I guess I should have included a footnote in my email about Sven Nykvist yesterday, but I was in the computer lab at school and was having a hard time collecting my thoughts, especially given the glitch I experienced the first time I tried composing the message.  Anyway, if I could add one personal thought to the original missive it would be that when I started really reading and studying a lot about movies when I was in 6th-7th grade, Nykvist was the first cinemtographer  I learned to recognize by name. Of course, it would be a few years before a jr. high kid growing up in Garland in the early 70's would get the chance to actually see a Bergman-Nykvist film...but at least I was prepared when the day finally came.  
    Anyway, cliche that it is, his passing only reminds me of my own faded youth...and how much more I've learned since then."

--M*lani* Pruit

"Morning train--
Entering the dark tunnel
Suddenly: my face"

--Marco Fratic*lli


Fathom.


2.
smackdown and national bruxism
pillow cold warn strongly opal possibly
lookout card
Jada do craving

it conspiracy finish
pallor practically Algol
smackdown passport cranch
carving you Ramadan giddy Visa rush

squall psalm nightclub warrior giddy
grassy knoll
Miniron tribulations wouldn't


'Never value anything as profitable to thyself which shall compel thee to break thy promise, to lose thy self-respect, to hate any man, to suspect, to curse, to act the hypocrite, to desire anything which needs walls and curtains..' --Marcus Aur*lius

"The silence after geese
fade from sight
part of me following"

--David 3lliott


   Rocky Mini-World 134340

1.
if Youth throughout autopsy
all twinkling history
silkworm affadavit lurch had pink
had a gnat simply a sandbag champion kill

a lion
to blackjack
shocking catacombs swimming
curb stand twistboards up digital fracas chimp

sucking wound for pools
victim frabjous it crypt to crook run
full show and truthful
blackouts brown bag a popular ramp

razor stars
solid doubting wobbly world idolatry
suspicions and rumors spliff
that polygraph python dusk

a young child assassin ring turncoat
additional crash
can commission downtown abruptly think gulls
Oak Cliff quick


Nykvist.

Ixion · oxidizing
Sisyphus pools · indigo loon
axis mists adorn · willow
tzompantli · birdtalk and aggry
ash bilk osmium · dying opt
thwart · sunlight usurp



"...the sons of bitches who killed America once & for all are walking around free. That’s what drives me crazy. And they will die comfortably in their beds. That, too, drives me crazy. But nothing drives me as fucking crazy as the fact that roughly half my countrymen inhabit the same moral hell as the torturers who rule us. That fact drives me nearly to despair."


"At heart
I am a Moslem
at heart
I am an American artist"

--Patti Smith, 3ast*r


"In truth, 'Seattle's wisdom' came from the pen of a white screenwriter from Texas, and his moving words were the single highlight of an obscure television script on pollution produced by the Southern Baptist Convention in 1972." --Playing Indian, which points to R*cov*ring th* Word: 3ssays on Nativ* Am*rican Lit*ratur* pp 497-536.

Rambl* Hous* Onlin* ! (K**l*r, Gadsby, Cadav*r of Gid*on Wyck...)

   "XXXIII.

Of meadows drowsy with Trinacrian bees,
Of shapes that moved a rising mist among--
Persephone between the Cypress trees--
Of lengthier shades along the woodland flung,
Of calm upon the hardly whispering seas,
Of cloud that to the distant island clung--
He made of emerald evening and of these
A holier song than ever yet was sung.

But silence and the single-thoughted night,
Hearing such music took him for their own
To that long land, where, men forgotten quite
Harpless he errs by Lethe stream alone.
He never more will know that wind-flower's white--
He never more shall hear uneasy autumn moan."

--B*lloc


"Note: Jane Dunlap is a pseudonym for Adelle Davis who is better known for her books on natural foods and nutrition."


"starting to rain
shower of petals
on last year's garden"

--M L Bittl*-D*Lapa

("Tornado Ov*r Kansas" by John St*uart Curry)


   "CI.

Angels I saw at night knock at the wine-house gate:
They shaped the clay of Adam, flung into moulds its weight.

Spirits of the Unseen World of Purities divine,
With me an earth-bound mortal, poured forth their 'wildering wine.

Heaven, from its heavy trust aspiring to be free,
The duty was allotted, mad as I am, to me.

Thank God my friend and I once more sweet peace have gained!
For this the houris dancing thanksgiving cups have drained.

With Fancy's hundred wisps what wonder that I've strayed,
When Adam in his prudence was by a grain bewrayed?

Excuse the wrangling sects, which number seventy-two:
They knock at Fable's portal, for Truth eludes their view.

No fire is that whose flame the taper laughs to scorn:
True fire consumes to ashes the moth's upgarnered corn.

Blood fills recluses' hearts where Love its dot doth place,
Fine as the mole that glistens upon a charmer's face.

    As Háfiz, none Thought's face
    Hath yet unveiled; not e'en
    Since for the brides of Language
    Combed have their tresses been."

--Háfiz (tr H Bickn*ll, in: P*rsian Lit*ratur* 1900)


Scifi stars list with maps. (via M*tafilt*r)


L*agu* of th* Militant Godl*ss.


On my victrola- Lucinda Williams: Car Wh**ls on a Grav*l Road


"moss hung trees
a deer moves into
the hunter's silence"

--Winona Bak*r

"Cambodia is a dream come true for international losers--a beautiful but badly beaten woman, staked out on an anthill for every predator in the world to do with what he wishes." --Anthony Bourdain, A Cook's Tour (2001)


    "xxii.

Mother of all my cities once there lay
   About your weedy wharves an orient shower
   Of spice and languorous silk and all the dower
That Ocean gave you on his bridal day.
And now the youth and age have passed away
   And all the sail superb and all the power;
   Your time's a time of memory like that hour
Just after sunset, wonderful and grey.

Too tired to rise and much too sad to weep,
   With strong arm nerveless on a neveless knee,
Still to your slumbering ears the spousal deep
   Murmurs his thoughts of eld eternally;
But your soul wakes not from its holy sleep
Dreaming of dead delights beside a tideless sea."

--B*lloc


The Age of Propaganda is followed by The Age of Mosquitos.

--sayings of Asmoday


Patriots.


R*d Star Rogu*.

(via flyingturtl*toys dot com)


"sharply we flower in this foul farewell" --Conrad Aik*n


   "DOWN CHANNEL

The Channel pours out on the Ebb in a river gigantic.
  There is no Moon.
The Dark is low in a cloud on the huge Atlantic.
  We'll be raising the Lizard soon.

There will be no meeting of eyes, nor any blessing,
  After the run.
The lips are still and the hand has ceased from caressing.
  There is nothing more to be done."

--Hillair* B*lloc, Sonn*ts & V*rs* (1944)


"This has to be the most handy piece of cooking instruction embedded in a cultural text since Master P's "Ghetto D"."


'Man and the unthought are, at the archaeological level, contemporaries.' --Foucault, quoted in: Robin Blas*r, "Th* Practic* of Outsid*"

"But in these times of global madness, as World War III perhaps gets underway, who really cares about Language Poetry being to the Academy of American Poets what Stravinsky is to Brahms, or what Cindy Sherman is to Edward Weston?"


War pigs. (via Juan Col*)


"winter moon
taking all night to cross
so small a pond"

--K*n Hurm, in: Haiku Mom*nt ed Bruc* Ross (1993)



   "BAT-GEODE

Bat-geode, the
geode has a bat inside it.

Fine inlay work, gold
and brown for the wings and peak ears

fuzzy russet blot face.

Upright phoenix bird
out of a grey sun, an iris, an orchid
without a name...

no, it
is a bat, crystal bat

split, spread flat
its guts

yellow quartz.

When I look inside
I see layer and layer of cracked ice, long
plains of ice, nothing on them, the plains

crazed, nothing on them, cold plains of nothing.

Only the wind
moves over them, the wind

and one crystal bat looking for another."

--John Tagg*rt, Prism and th* Pin* Twig (1977)

A not long ago pic.

Original, anci*nt music at Civilization On* dot com.


OuLiPo links. (via wood_s lot)


"...the most influential online zine for American poetry is published by John Tranter in Australia."


'CASIDA OF THE RECLINING WOMAN

To see you naked is to remember the earth.
The smooth earth, swept clean of horses.
The earth without a reed, the pure form
closed to the future: confine of silver.

To see you naked is to comprehend the desire
of the rain which seeks the feeble form,
or the fever of the sea when its immense face
cannot find the light of its cheek.

The blood will resound through the bedrooms
and arrive with flashing sword,
but you will not know where the heart
of the toad or the violet hide.

Your belly is a battle of roots,
your lips are a blurred dawn.
Under the tepid roses of the bed
the dead moan, waiting their turn.'

--F*d*rico García Lorca (tr N di Giovanni), in: S*l*ct*d Po*ms (1955)

(via tropicalisland dot d*)


"I hear the waves on our island shore
They sound much louder than they did before
A rising swell flecked with foam
Threatens the existence of our island home.
 
A strong wind blows in from a distant place
The palm trees bend like never before
Our crops are lost to the rising sea
And water covers our humble floor.

Our people are leaving for a distant shore
And soon Tuvalu may be no more
Holding on to the things they know are true
Tuvalu my Tuvalu, I cry for you.

And as our people are forced to roam
To another land to call their home
And as you go to that place so new
Take a little piece of Tuvalu with you.

Tuvalu culture is rare and unique
And holds a message we all should seek
Hold our culture way up high
And our beloved Tuvalu will never die."

--Jan* R*stur*


Shadowplay.


tarragon · waft prolong iron
harrows Ogpu · forlorn Angkor
swimming rat · afflict still up
grow polyps floss · portal into
ogham mists · iron torturing inch
   what raw hronir · crouch