GETTING READY FOR POETRY MONTH (OF WHICH THERE ARE TWELVE)

I guess the idea of naming a month for something brings more attention to it. And I can guess why they picked April for poetry. But I read and write poetry pretty much every day, and have all my adult life, and a lot of my pre-adult life as well.

Here are three poetry books I recently read that were worth checking out for me:

SAVE TWILIGHT by Julio Cortazar (translated by Stepehn Kessler). Cortazar is an Argentinian author best know for his fiction, especially his novel HOPSCOTCH. Published by City Lights, I expected SAVE TWILIGHT to be more raw than at times Kessler's uneven translation is. But some of these Selected Poems are a revelation. As in this brilliantly translated line from "Clearance Sale"—

"I close my eyes and I'm laid out in your memory, barely alive,
with my mouth wide open and the river of oblivion rising."

AN UNCHANGING BLUE is another Selected Poems (1962-75). This time from the German poet Rolf Dieter Brinkmann and translated by the American poet Mark Terrill, who has lived in Germany for many years (and whose own BREAD & FISH is one of my all-time favorite books of poetry).

Brinkmann was a poet of my generation, influenced by "American" poetry, especially by William Carlos Williams, Frank O'Hara and my old friend the late great Ted Berrigan. Born in Germany toward the end of WWII and growing up in postwar ruins etc. may partly explain the grim sense of humor, or humorous sense of grimness, his poems express. But nonetheless they resonate with life in spite of themselves.

Here's a short one, and as usual with his poems the title is the first line:

"A Single Sentence

or even
several. One after the other.
An entire flower bed.

And again sentences.
Others. Other
flowers, for once and for all.
Finally.

Flowers, which
extend roots—
the question would remain
what for."

ALPHA DONUT by Matvei Yankelevich was a pleasure to read, for me. It reminded me of an early book of mine, ROCKY DIES YELLOW, which included a variety of approaches to poems that at times seemed fragmentary or structurally incompatible (as it turns out in ALPHA DONUT this is the result of many of the short pieces being fragments from disparate, or at least separate, longer works).

But this "Selected Shorter Works Of Matvei Yankelevich" is totally original. With only a few exceptions, every page rewarded me with a surprising use of imagery or language and all in a accessible even conversational way that too much of contemporary poetry mishandles.

Here are two brief examples:

"Are you

wearing my jacket

somewhere? I know

I'm not wearing your hat."


"Why would I live so long? Who wants to watch their friends grow up into the people who publish a book a year, or have their 'work' represented by a gallery and talk about whether it's selling, and to whom. No, I don't want to see my friends grow up like that."

A lot of it is clever in ways that gives clever a good name again. Like this mini mash up of modernism most poets, or at least this one, will smile at:

"only the red (wheel

barrow

has such small) hands"

DONALD MCLAUGHLIN ART SHOW

My good friend and neighbor Don McLaughlin's got a new show of his art hanging in the Howard Scott Gallery in Chelsea. if you're in or around that area before the show ends on April 12th, I highly recommend it.

Don has never followed fads or trends or whatever-the-art-world-is-genuflecting-to-at-the-moment jive, but is just a hardworking old style painter and water colorist whose work spans the spectrum from almost figurative to uniquely abstract without demanding categorization or analysis.

Though there is an evocative depth to the imagery when you encounter it in person, the big thrill for me is just being hit with a painterly experience that's personal and individual in a way I find totally refreshing. It renews my love of art, as opposed to art world event-ism.

So, like I said, if you have cause to be in Manhattan before April 12th, take the elevator to the 7th floor at 529 West 20th Street and treat yourself to a pleasant experience.

A QUESTION FOR YOU

Other people's dreams are one of the least interesting things to most people. Jack Kerouac wrote an entire book describing his and it is the only book of his I never dip into nor would ever dip into again.

So I'm not going to bore anyone with my dreams. But I have a question that's been in the back of my mind all my life. Or ever since I left home in my late teens in 1960. Because since then, ninety-nine percent of my dreams that I remember when I wake up are set in or around my childhood home.

Sometimes Manhattan is across the street from it, or China out back (I remember that happening a lot in the late 1960s when Mao and China loomed large in leftist arguments), sometimes the house is empty or one or more of my late siblings and late parents are there, either as they were when I was young or as they were in their later years.

Often the interior of the house varies, rooms are larger, ceilings higher, but just as often it's exactly as it was when I was a boy. But with rare exceptions I am almost assuming occur, because I can't remember even one at the moment, (wait, I remember one that took place inside the Catholic church I went to Mass at every Sunday morning until I left home, Our Lady of Sorrows—which it occurs to me explains the kind of woman I was often attracted to), my dreams involve my childhood home.

So my question is: anyone out there share this experience in their dream life?

MORE OF THE LITERARY LIFE

Me at a reading I did at Books & Co. c. 1980. That's poet Greg Masters right behind my right shoulder and two other poets whose names I know well but this late at night with my post-op brain I can't get those names to come out of my fingers onto the keyboard! [As I was falling asleep the name of the bearded poet all the way to my right came to me: Gary Lenhart—and then the name, I think, of the bespectacled one all the way to my left: Steve Levine] [I've been reminded that this is likely a reading I did with Ray DiPalma and Ted Greenwald, but these are the only two photos I was given by whoever took them]

Me and poet/dance critic Edwin Denby I think at the same reading as above only after I took my coat off (with I believe poet Nick Piombino over my right shoulder).

Me and actress Karen Allen at a reading at The Bookstore in Lenox, Mass. c. 1997 (Karen introduced a solo reading for my then new book CANT BE WRONG).

Poet/writer Aram Saroyan, poet/songwriter Terence Winch and me at a reading at Book Soup in Hollywood sometimes in the 1990s [1994, see Terry's comment below].

Fiction writer Dale Herd and me at a reading I gave at Beyond Baroque in Venice, CA, c. 2004.

Me and poet Ray DiPalma at a reading we did at St. Marks, NYC, I think in 2011.

TIME FOR SOME SINATRA

ANOTHER FAVORITE QUOTE

"Life is neither good nor bad; it is original."  —Italo Svevo (from Confessions of Zeno, translated by Beryl de Zoete)

JAMES REBHORN R.I.P.

I never worked with James Rebhorn that I can remember. [Turns out we were both in BASIC INSTINCT and both worked on a short-lived TV soap TEXAS, but not in the same scenes.] I used to see him around my town in Jersey and we'd nod to each other. And once we chatted a bit when we both attended a meet and greet with that vegetarian, Steiner-school educated, ex-Ohio mayor who became a Congressman and ran for president whose name I can't think of right now [Dennis Kucinich].

Rebhorn was a great actor. As the father on Showtime's HOMELAND in recent years, and the auto mechanics expert in the classic flick MY COUSIN VINNIE, as well as in numerous other movies and TV shows, he always hit the exact right note. As someone who has acted in smaller roles on TV and in movies I know how challenging that can sometimes be.

I always say starring in a show, which I have done, the challenge is you're responsible for the story working over all. You basically carry the show on your shoulders. But having a small part in a movie or TV show is like having an artist almost complete a painting and then asking you to fill in a few spots.

You have to conform to someone else's vision and style and working habits and personality and pace etc. etc. etc. Insert yourself into someone else's story and make it work, without "stealing the show" from the star. Rebhorn always nailed it.

I would like to have told him that the few times we passed each other in the street. But I'm sure there were plenty who did. My condolences to his family, friends and fans.