Flowers that Gloze

Go here for glozing.

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).

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!!

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...

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

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.

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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.

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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

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.