Flowers that Glide

Flowers that Gloze

2006-07-06T10:59:00.000-04:00

Go here for glozing.

2006-06-08T10:17:00.000-04:00

It has been some hectic times here. Suz's job search has heated up with some second interviews, and we could be staying here or moving somewhere else. We were in DC last weekend which was pretty fun. It is super expensive to live there, however, and I have long been resigned to not making money.

Going to see Band of Horses in Detroit this weekend. Also listening to Captain Beefheart, Can, Elvis Costello's last record, which is better than I anticipated, Beirut, Sunset Rubdown, the new Paul Simon (also pretty good -- Eno did soundscapes for it, and Paul Simon is a tasty marshmallow by god).

2006-04-20T10:24:00.000-04:00

Winter has finally passed here in Michigan, and I am in a more open mood. The dissertation is nearing completion, and I am feeling very positive about it. It has some strong work in it and lots of room for stronger work to come. I'm pleased with myself a little, which is good.

I've been reading many, many interesting books of poems...perhaps most notably the Philip Jenks books. I highly recommend them. Peter O'Leary's new book Depth Theology is also very good and invigorating.

Final touches have been put on my new book Little Ease, which should be out in September from Ahsahta. The cover art by Jeff Clark is really exciting to me. I've always been a big fan of his covers, and I'm thrilled to have my book graced with one. I hope to be able to make a strong effort to get out and read in many places in the next year.

GutCult is feeling a boost from its new contributing editor Arda Collins. I'm really looking forward to the direction the magazine is headed. It's hard to believe I've been doing it for so long. May it go on for 2 or 3 times as long as it's gone on so far.

A pretty day here.

That Is What I'm Talkin About!!

2006-02-05T22:56:00.000-05:00

Ugly win...still a win. 26 years I've been waiting for this feeling again. I don't know who I am in a world where my team is the champ...

All ye know on earth and all ye need to know...

2005-12-16T10:36:00.000-05:00

Apply this line of reasoning to all future endeavors...

from Hannah Arendt, “What is Freedom?” from Between Past and Future (New York: Viking, 1961).

p. 152 “Action insofar as it is free is neither under the guidance of the intellect nor under the dictate of the will—although it needs both for the execution of any particular goal—but springs from something altogether different which (following Montesquieu’s famous analysis of forms of government) I shall call a principle. Principles do not operate from within the self as motives do—‘mine own deformity’ or my ‘fair proportion’—but inspire, as it were, from without; and they are much too general to prescribe particular goals, although every particular aim can be judged in the light of its principle once the act has been started. For, unlike the judgment of the intellect which precedes action, and unlike the command of the will which initiates it, the inspiring principle becomes fully manifest only in the performing act itself.”

p. 156 “For this world of ours, because it existed before us and is meant to outlast our lives in it, simply cannot afford to give primary concern to individual lives and the interest connected with them; as such the public realm stands in the sharpest possible contrast to our private domain, where in the protection of family and home, everything serves and must serve the security of the life process. It requires courage even to leave the protective security of our four walls and enter the public realm, not because of particular dangers which may lie in wait for us, but because we have arrived in a realm where the concern for life has lost its validity. Courage liberates men from their worry about life for the freedom of the world. Courage is indispensable because in politics not life the world is at stake.”

p.168 “We find in these parts of the New Testament an extraordinary understanding of freedom, and particularly of the power inherent in human freedom; but the human capacity which corresponds to this power, which, in the words of the Gospel, is capable of removing mountains, is not will but faith. The work of faith, actually its product, is what the gospels called ‘miracles,’ a word with many meanings in the New Testament and difficult to understand. We can neglect the difficulties here and refer only to those passages where miracles are clearly not supernatural events but only what all miracles, those performed by men no less than those performed by a divine agent , always must be, namely, interruptions of some natural series of events, of some automatic process, in whose context they constitute the wholly unexpected.
“No doubt human life, placed on the earth, is surrounded by automatic processes—by the natural process of the earth, which, in turn, are surrounded by cosmic processes, and we ourselves are driven by similar forces insofar as we too are a part of organic nature. Our political life, moreover, despite, its being the realm of action, also takes place in the midst of processes which we call historical and which tend to become as automatic as natural or cosmic processes, although they were started by men. The truth is that automatism is inherent in all processes, no matter what their origin may be—which is why no single act, and no single even can ever, once and for all, deliver and save a man, or a nation, or mankind. It is in the nature of the automatic process to which man is subject, but within and against which he can assert himself through action, that they can only spell ruin for human life.”

p. 169 “Every act, seen from the perspective not of the agent but of the process in whose framework it occurs and whose automatism it interrupts, is a ‘miracle’—that is, something which could not be expected. If it is true that action and beginning are essentially the same, it follows that a capacity for performing miracles must likewise be within the range of human faculties. This sounds stranger than it actually is. It is in the very nature of every new beginning that it breaks into the world as an ‘infinite improbability,’ and yet it is precisely this infinitely improbable which actually constitutes the very texture of everything we call real.”

Resurrection Update

2005-11-17T12:09:00.000-05:00

I’m listening to “the Wichita Lineman” at the moment, and taking notes on a book I recently read about a case of demon possession in the 1570s, but I’ve been meaning to take a few moments to post to the blog. Why? Well, my feelings about the whole genre of discourse (blogging, that is) have remained so mixed during the full run of time I’ve been participating. I really don’t have much patience for the schoolyard crap that features prominently in the conversation every time people get bored or can’t think of anything real to talk about. On the other hand, I have been deeply inspired, encouraged, and educated by those stretches where people are powerfully absorbed by their materials.

Last week, Suz and I watched the documentary “Revolution OS” about the freesoftware movement and the birth of gnu, linux, open source, etc. Particularly moving to me was the demagoguery of Richard Stallman, who is described as the “philosopher” behind open source. He – like any passionate and visionary person, probably – is a mixture of pitiful oddness and stunning charisma. I recommend the film, even if you don’t care much about computer code, for Stallman’s account of the atmosphere at MIT when preceding and during the development of the gnu system. It reminded me a lot of what I love most about Ron Silliman, and it—again—got me thinking about how crucial community, including its discomforts, is for the production of meaningful contributions to culture.

I guess, based on my personal temperament, I’m going to be forced to plug in and out of the public conversation repeatedly. I’m not sure. When I do plug in, I want it to be because I have something to say, however, not because I feel duty-bound to keep the chatter flowing.

+++

I’m going to be reading at the Cloister in the East Village between 2nd and 3rd on Sunday, Nov. 20 at 8pm with Jeff Encke. It’s part of the Burning Chair Series. I’d love to see you.

+++

Have been redesigning GutCult for a sleeker look as part of the on-going process of deepening its method and mission. The superficial dimension (the look) is the thing over which I have most control in the short-term, so that’s what I’m tackling. Superficial as it may be, coding is not easy for me, so it takes time. The upcoming issue will be a very good one, but it will only be a prologue, I hope of things to come as the magazine continues to evolve.

What's Up

2005-10-18T12:20:00.000-04:00

I haven't posted anything in a while. Despite Silliman's suggestion that the blog world is the 'hang-out' of the poetry world (a claim which I think has validity), I've been hanging out in other places. Mainly, my dissertation is absorbing my time. That's as it should be, no doubt. I have found--in my leisure time--a way back to songwriting and recording, which makes me really happy. I've recorded something like 5 songs in the last few weeks. Not sure where they are coming from, but probably just stored up energy. I'm like an elaborate residuum of creative energy. If I take time off from any of my projects, they ultimately break down the door. My excesses do not disappoint me. Call me pseudo-Dionysus. I rock multitudes.

For What its Worth

2005-09-11T12:05:00.000-04:00

Please scan this list of corporations before you go on your next consumption binge. Procotting may not be the best answer, but it is one answer.

By Request...More Them Anatomies

2005-09-05T14:50:00.000-04:00

A while back, I posted the two newer EPs of my songwriting project/alter-ego Them Anatomies (you can find them in the link bar on the right), and I promised I would follow-up with the earlier ones if there was any interest. I've got another EP and a "outake/b-side" collection to post in the future. So, here we go...

These songs comprise "Battlestations" (recorded in Raleigh, NC and Iowa City, IA by me)

1. No Sir, Francis Bacon
2. Garden Needs Weedin'
3. Toenails
4. Hard Postcard
5. Pieces of Skylab
6. Pneumatic Concerns
7. Transmission to Dark Planet
8. Space Debt Cadet
9. Tee Pee

2005-08-30T17:19:00.000-04:00

An intellectual hatred is the worst,
So let her think opinions are accursed.

-WBY, "A Prayer For My Daughter"

2005-08-14T01:05:00.000-04:00

"We have been schooled in a sterile addiction to contradiction that has robbed us repeatedly of all real openness to any more expansive and ennobling truth" - Sogyal Rinpoche

2005-07-27T11:17:00.000-04:00

From the bank, sometimes higher ones, with the smell of metal in his head, he could understand why the patients tried to escape this way and the Spaniards. He often wanted to flee, himself, but recognized that the river was one kind of thing and he was another.

2005-07-21T11:53:00.000-04:00

Even though everything was gray and tasted like a penny, he could look to the northeast and see this enormous foot his father's heart was bent around.

2005-07-18T10:33:00.000-04:00

This was where -- with the taste of a penny on the tongue -- he saw most of his first things. Never swam in the river. That house is gone. The bridges humming. In the distance you can see the smoke stacks. These are tanneries. Were. The tanneries are gone.

Coconut Poetry Issue #1

2005-07-15T17:53:00.000-04:00

Lots of poetry to be read and savored over at Bruce Covey's Coconut, just up now.

Contents include work by:
alice notley
david trinidad
danielle pafunda
sawako nakayasu
wang ping
katy lederer
jon leon
amy gerstler
aaron mccollough
sueyeun juliette lee
frank menchaca
shanna compton
ken rumble
lisa lubasch
amy king
bruce covey
laurel snyder
alex lemon

Links to Online Content Involving Me

2005-05-17T18:40:00.000-04:00

Here is a semi-complete list of online content (poems, essays, reviews, & readings) by the artist currently known as Aaron McCollough. I will update this on occasion and put a link in the side bar for easy access.

Poems:

Coconut Poetry #1
Free Verse 8
MiPoesias 19.3
Raised in a Barn 4
Word/For Word 1.1
CWHOBB 11
Slope 17
Eratio 2
Typo 3
Drunken Boat 6
Stride
Jacket 26
Shearsman 60

Reviews/Articles (by me & of me):

Tony Tost's Invisible Bride
Thoughts on Ronald Johnson
Review of Cal Bedient's Violence of the Morning
Review of Michael Farrell's ode ode (the first Salt book I ever read!)
Review of Double Venus by the late Kevin McGowin
Review of Double Venus by Stan Mir
Interview with me at Here Comes Everybody

Reading Audio:

With Lewis Robinson (requires real audio player)
"The Acts" (part of "Amazing Grace" from John Fahey's 'America')
"Jesus Is A Dying Bedmaker" pt. 1 (from John Fahey's 'America')
"Jesus Is A Dying Bedmaker" pt. 2 (from John Fahey's 'America')

William Perkins sez...

2005-05-09T23:56:00.000-04:00

"And this is the common fault of the world: men [sic] that lightly regard and slackely performe the duties of their owne callings, are neuerthelesse very readie to talke of and enquire into the state and liues of other men [sic]: and it is meat and drinke vnto them. Let a good report be giuen out of a man [sic], it is not regarded, but euil reports are taken vp at the first rebound: they run like wildfire, and all this ariseth from vaine curiositie, which is here condemned as the bane of all societies. These busie-bodies are like to such as read bookes, with intent only to spie out the faults thereof: and they are like to the spider, that creepes ouer all the garden onely to gather poison. But men [sic] that feare God must learne to knowe their owne businesse, and to suffer their talke and meditation to be imployed that way." -- A Treatise On Callings, 1612.

Some Food...

2005-05-02T00:58:00.000-04:00

Here, Chris Hamilton-Emery (the publisher, incidentally, of my second book) says some very interesting and challenging things worth pondering at length. I shall return to it. In any case, what Chris has to say is very very smart -- if sobering. Salt has one of the most interesting, varied lists the poetry publishing world has ever seen and it should come as no surprise. You don't have to buy my book, but you should buy something by Salt and see for yourself.

Another Aphorism...

2005-02-07T13:22:00.000-05:00

The person who kills two birds with one stone has still wasted a stone.

Another Aphorism...

2005-01-27T11:10:00.000-05:00

Capitalism doesn't care about poetry, only Poetry cares about capitalism.

New Issue of Free Verse

2005-01-11T01:16:00.000-05:00

Please go read the whole issue of Free Verse. Many friendly faces appear there, including Tost (my bizarro world double -- or is he my regular world double? In any case, for the record, I am actually the author of Invisible Bride).

Also, Stan Mir has written a review of my book, Double Venus. Many thanks to the magazine for this and to Stan for his generous and rigorous reading.

New GutCult is all coded. Should be up by mid-week.

Another Aphorism...

2005-01-07T13:59:00.000-05:00

Often, as I find myself obliged to perform one or another momentary ritual or duty (the very stuff of my life), I'm also tempted to "take a day off." Doing so is often recommended, after all. But a job is like living, not the other way around. If I were to take a day off from living, I would surely die.

Another Aphorism...

2005-01-02T10:55:00.000-05:00

2, 3, 4, 5, etc. 1 is a fable. Consider the generation of the trees. Sometimes it is best to believe in 1. Sometimes it is harmful. Life could be summarized as a long attempt at figuring out when and when not to believe in 1.

Another Aphorism...

2005-01-02T10:54:00.000-05:00

You speak too much and too little. What are you afraid of?

Another Aphorism...

2005-01-02T10:53:00.000-05:00

Buzzard in my father's field, what will hop like that over your bones?

Another Aphorism...

2005-01-02T10:52:00.000-05:00

Which Sequoia, the tree or the alphabet of a vanquished people?

Another Aphorism...

2005-01-02T10:51:00.000-05:00

The principles of animation -- cell on cell; stasis to kinesis -- may be illusory and/or real. I can't say. Either way, it is exciting to think that periods can make a line and a line can lead us out of the labyrinth.

Another Aphorism...

2005-01-02T10:48:00.000-05:00

An hundred year oak; an hundred years war. Quel dommage.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-19T10:48:00.000-05:00

They say you are grappling for your place with everyone who ever lived, as if one lived in place.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-17T13:18:00.000-05:00

Asking for too much care about one's audience is a bit like self-hatred.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-17T08:39:00.000-05:00

O, fundamentalist, do you really think wisdom only happens once.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-17T08:34:00.000-05:00

Wicked adversary. Witless adversary. It doesn't matter. One needs the temptation to cruelty if one wishes for the grace not to take it.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-16T11:58:00.000-05:00

If you are worried about the range of your voice, try resting it. If that doesn't work, try a different one. If that doesn't work, stop worrying, you weren't meant to be heard.

Another Aphorism....

2004-12-16T11:56:00.000-05:00

In the lunar-lander glow of the passing bus, someone is exactly right: it is there, I am here.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-16T11:55:00.000-05:00

Plato was a turd. If he lasts, it is as a turdnut.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-16T11:50:00.000-05:00

Don't comfort yourself with what will last. That giant old tree (the one you can drive through), even that will not last.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-16T10:52:00.000-05:00

Infamy is good for nobody; Profanity is sometimes good for nobody.

New Poet AudBlog Consortium

2004-12-15T23:56:00.000-05:00

Hey, everybody, come on...it's Spaceship Tumblers, the blog where poets like me read poems outloud into their telephones. Mosted by the host with the tost, the hardest working mensch in po-schlitz: Tawn Tahst.

Lance, you better start thinking about including a CD with the HCE book, bro. 136 trax of Tost and McCollough anyone?

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-15T10:30:00.000-05:00

(for Araki Yasusada)

It is difficult to love by not knowing; it is difficult to be loved by not being known.

"Into the Company...

2004-12-15T01:44:00.000-05:00

...of love it all returns" -- R. Creeley, "For Love"

Them Anatomies - I Hope You're Feeling Fine EP

2004-12-13T23:45:00.000-05:00

I'm posting my Them Anatomies Recordings in reverse chronology. If you look at the links to the right, you'll see that I have added a spot for permalinks to the various track lists. I'll update it as I fill out the list.

The EP was recorded in Raleigh, Iowa City, and Chattanooga. The slickest production tracks had help from Charles, but all of it is "home-taped."

Here's the track list...all songs 256K VBR:

1. I Don't Miss Her (2:51)
2. Chicago (1:55)
3. Carboat Trip (2:41)
4. I Hope You're Feeling Fine (2:08)
5. Country Serotonin I (:55)
6. Stop Wanting (2:08)
7. Station 451 (1:50)

My Motto

2004-12-11T01:31:00.000-05:00

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-10T14:34:00.000-05:00

The laziest puritan is more productive than the most zealous apathetic.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-09T11:48:00.000-05:00

Eight cups of coffee and thoughts of revenge. How dreadful. Like a rusted-out can in the woods for my breakfast.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-07T09:20:00.000-05:00

Jealousy makes a haunting echo of its object.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-05T10:17:00.000-05:00

Ten thousand is plenty.

Another Aphorism...

2004-12-05T09:45:00.000-05:00

There have been societies whose bureaucrats were fine poets. There have been societies whose poets were fine bureaucrats.

Them Anatomies - Sister Cities / Lovers Demos

2004-12-03T23:13:00.000-05:00

Well, I have been sitting on these recordings for a while, and I don't know if I am going to finish the record or not. My life is pretty hectic, and there is not a lot of time for setting up all my recording gear and then breaking it all back down, etc. There is a chance that I will record some more tracks with Charles over the holidays, which I would love to do, but until then, I am posting these track for your listening pleasure. If you like them, please download them and put them in your iTunes. I've encoded them as mp3s at 256kbs VBR, so they should sound ok.

Here'a the track list:

1. Big Star Cover 1:08
2. Fire's On the Phone 2:16
3. Good News 2:29
4. Little Crow 2:29
5. Song For Puckheads 1:19
6. Try My Flashlight 2:23
7. Via Positiva 1:18

Another Aphorism

2004-11-17T13:25:00.000-05:00

Dirty plates and glasses are all over the kitchen counter. As daunting as it can be, death is still just like them. There to be done.

Another Aphorism

2004-11-16T09:57:00.000-05:00

A good marriage is less romantic than the flint-lock pistol. It isn't like a war or a powdered wig.

Another Aphorism

2004-11-15T09:33:00.000-05:00

People who refer to themselves as taxpayers should leave feeling alone. Among its many mirages is not a structured system of entitlement.

Another Aphorism

2004-11-11T14:20:00.000-05:00

If you've forgotten what day it is, don't worry. It isn't judgment day.

Another Aphorism

2004-11-07T13:46:00.000-05:00

The wind moving over the lawn pushes many of the leaves but not one in just the way of any other. Right and wrong. Watch things in the wind then tell me about them.

Another Aphorism

2004-10-28T17:17:00.000-04:00

Last night I watched the glum shadow of our world try to eclipse the moon, but they say genre theory is making a comeback. One has to look into it.

Another Aphorism

2004-10-08T19:40:00.000-04:00

The little boy tells the dog to be quiet through the window screen. The dog tells the little boy to be quiet. A family is in mourning. Silence is both a necessity and also a necessary subject of debate.

A Poem by Me @ The Shearsman

2004-09-28T22:17:00.000-04:00

The print version of this came out in august, but the online version is now up at the Shearsman. The poem was in the manuscript for Little Ease, which is slated to come out with Ahsahta in 2006 (a fact I have neglected to post here for no good reason). I've removed this poem from the manuscript for the present. Not because I don't think it good, but because it doesn't fit anywhere anymore. I've still got a year or so to edit and fuss around, however, so who knows. For the moment, it is an outtake/b-side/rarity (in Tostian terms).

Another Aphorism

2004-09-27T13:56:00.000-04:00

When catching a glimpse of skin -- the small of a stranger's back at a coffee table, a shin, a calf, whatever -- he tries to remember that the skin is first of all an organ, like the gallbladder. Thoughtlessly, then, thoughts of gallbladders tend to pass to other thoughts. How are his friends? When will he see them again?

Another Aphorism

2004-09-24T18:09:00.000-04:00

When lingering, for whatever reason, on thoughts of death, it is best to go for a walk. Although you shall never outpace such thoughts, you may see more clearly that all things (as beautifully composed as every day is) are moving towards one shared limit. The composition can only be our heaven. The limit can only be a fable.

Another Aphorism

2004-09-22T13:03:00.000-04:00

He would separate the rays of the sun from the sun itself, but he is a ventriloquist. One never knows if it is he or his doll who speaks.

An Aphorism

2004-09-21T10:03:00.000-04:00

The broken little yellow bird. One of His abandoned creatures, shocked in the breeze. People say, "don't make something out of nothing." As if there were such a thing as nothing, and they had seen it.

2 ratios on Herbert

2004-09-06T22:50:00.001-04:00

I'm currently reading Kamau Braithwaite's Black + Blues, which is a beautiful thing. One of the very early poems in the book is called "Totem." I couldn't help hearing Herbert's famous "shape" poem in there, and so I decided to write my own ratio on that poem, too, and post all three. I tend not to want to publish my own poems here for reasons that may be completely specious, but in this case I thought the process might be somewhat interesting. So, first is my poem, then Braithwaite's, then Herbert's. I suppose it makes most sense to read in the reverse of that order, but I figured everyone had read Herbert, fewer had read Braithwaite, and none me, so...front load the swag, I say.


Piety / Pity





 I’m making my amends in sinews

           my sinews

 hot candle wax and blurry curse of

          singularity



 which is to say the sacrifice is pro-

            fane

 in the gap between the here

         and the frame



 before the consolation which flies

              I









Totem





 The altar must be made of skulls

spiked head of the slave by the wayside

   the bones that the dog shark’s

dark bark of teeth left by the sea side



   for bones are vegetable arms

       that clutch dreams

  that grow the fatty pork of flesh

       the gods will eat



        are relics ruins

        fetish of sperm

        totem of screams

     hollow bamboo branches



     of what was once a tree





The Altar



A broken Altar, Lord, thy servant rears,

Made of a heart, and cemented with tears:

 Whose parts are as thy hand did frame;

 No workmans tool hath touch’d the same.

          A Heart alone

          Is such a stone,

          Nothing but

          Thy pow’r doth cut.

          Wherefore each part

          Of my hard heart

          Meets in this frame,

          To praise thy name.

 That if I chance to hold my peace,

 These stones to praise thee may not cease.

O let thy blessed Sacrifice be mine,

And sanctifie this Altar to be thine.

Well Said, Winfried...

2004-08-30T18:18:00.000-04:00

"For days and weeks on end one racks one's brains to no avail, and, if asked, one could not say whether one goes on writing purely out of habit, or a craving for admiration, or because one knows not how to do anything other, or out of sheer wonderment, despair or outrage, any more than one could say whether writing tenders one more perceptive or more insane. Perhaps we all lose our sense of reality to the precise degree to which we are engrossed in our own work, and perhaps that is why we see in the increasing complexity of our mental constructs a means for greater understanding, even while intuitively we know that we shall never be able to fathom the imponderables that govern our course through life" -- from The Rings of Saturn.

Interview with Me Up

2004-07-13T22:51:00.000-04:00

I'm up in the Here Comes Everybody interview sweepstakes. Batting after Tony Tost is a challenge. I'll try to drive him home.

GutCult update

2004-06-22T14:25:00.000-04:00

Figured out what was wrong with GC. Apparently, the nameservers changed. Have remedied the problem, but the remedy may not take effect for 24 hrs.

New Issue of GUTCULT up

2004-06-17T20:49:00.000-04:00

I am pleased to announce that the newest issue of GutCult is up.

This issue features many US poets you will know and many you may not (including but not limited to Anselm Berrigan, Tony Tost, Shanna Compton, Arielle Greenberg, Laura Solomon, Stan Mir, Carolina Maugeri, and Maryrose Larkin).

Also, the new issue features an Australian poetry section edited by Michael Farrell and a prose section.

Please click on the logo below to see the summer issue:

Review of Tost by Me Up Now

2004-06-09T00:38:00.000-04:00

I wrote a review of Tost's book over at Free Verse, click on logo below to go there:

In Case You Haven't Noticed

2004-04-14T10:23:00.000-04:00

Lance Phillips is doing something very interesting (and, I think, very important) at his blog. He would be embarrased for me to say so, but for me he is one of the few poets of my generation who has already demonstrated the promise to be truly inexhaustible and essential.

Also, the new issue of typo is up. It includes one of my poems from the Superliminare series as well as work by Josh and John.

Another Double Venus Review

2004-04-12T10:40:00.000-04:00

Jonathan Minton (editor of Word/For Word) has performed an analytical review of Double Venus at eratio postmodern poetics. I find the review illuminating. It's always nice to have someone else teach you about your own work.

Here's a blurb-cloud excerpt: "for McCollough ... earth-bound subjectivity is not only a matter of metaphysics, but a matter of ethics. In Double Venus, the very act of perception, with all its implied lyricism and metaphysics, is an especially fertile ground for a thorough scrutiny of public life, as well as the responsibilities of subjectivity in determining public life."

click on the eratio icon to go to the review:

Muchos gracias to Jonathan and the folks at eratio postmodern poetics.

Double Venus Review at Eclectica

2004-04-05T12:04:00.000-04:00

Kevin McGowin has written a very kind response to Double Venus at eclectica.org. Many thanks to him for the time and interest. Here's a meta-blurb:

"With exceptions ("The Shipwreck of the Singular"), the volume's most riveting passages do not have conventional "titles" as such—though the one I've just named is one of my favorites—but rather sequences of bracketed numbers followed by phrases. This reinforces the continuum and continuity of the imagery and rushing verbiage with its focus on the verb itself, and palpably identifiable objects, persons, and events stand alone between the surround-sound of this teeming biological imperative, for in Double Venus this is exactly what language itself becomes."

For the full review, click the logo below:

Off Cut Press

2004-03-05T10:50:00.000-05:00

This looks like a cool publisher. They print on other pubisher's waste materials, making the process cheap and environmentally generous.

Off Cut Press

Two New Poems @ Castagraf

2004-03-03T22:14:00.000-05:00

The new issue of Castagraf (#6) is up. Two of my poems appear there, both from a series called "Superliminare," which comes from the current manuscript. Tony is rocking it Invizzy-Brizzy-style up in there, too.

2 More Them Anatomies Tunes

2004-02-27T21:40:00.000-05:00

Here's a song from the "I Hope You're Feeling Fine EP," which I recorded about 1.5 years ago. This is one of my personal favorites. Something Catherine Daly said on Friendster about Chakras made me think to post the song here: Them Anatomies' "Apologia".

And here's an oldie, from my first cassette, "Double Bind"; the song is called "Rooms You Don't Go In".

The Incontinent Critic

2004-02-23T22:25:00.000-05:00

Announcing GutCult's desire to begin receiving small-press-published books of poems for review. If you would like your book to be considered for review, please send to Aaron McCollough, GutCult, English Dept., University of Michigan, 3187 Angell Hall, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1003.

Two Poems at Drunken Boat

2004-02-20T11:50:00.000-05:00

The new issue of Drunken Boat is up and includes two poems from me. One poem, "Columbia" is fairly old and is included in my first book. The other, "The Seventh Poem of Jan Vandermeer" is from the manuscript I am currently working on. They took the old one about 2 years ago, which is why the publication of the book preceded the publication of the poem online. The poems also include audio aplets of me reading. Here is a link: .