Everything

The radical poetry of 100 years ago was not radical in terms of style. It was conventional in terms of style and this doomed much of it (though not all of it) to being forgotten and rightfully so, but note that the folk songs and protest songs and blues songs of that period were not [...]

True standards are physical measurements. All other standards are evil metaphors of measurement created by systems of power to maintain control and to replace thinking. All standards are a form of virtual thinking–the law put in place to preclude any daily or ongoing assessment of values–to avoid all questioning. This is why I hate grants [...]

Last year, CAConrad’s A Beautiful Marsupial Afternoon—a book that encompassed a perfect blend of street insolence and elegiac tribute—was published. Raunchy and tantrumy, insightful and spiritually reverent, Rumpelstilskin-stampingly angry, and uproariously hilarious, it was a kind of hash oil distilled from its author’s originality and strangeness, and an unforgettable hymn of praise to the work [...]

. Late in the forest I did Cupid see _____Cold, wet, and crying, he had lost his way, _____And being blind was farther like to stray: _____Which sight a kind compassion bred in me, I kindly took and dried him, while that he, _____Poor child, complained he starved was with stay, _____And pined for want [...]

“Dear Mark” by Martin Rock Brooklyn Arts Press, 2013 ISBN 978-1936767199 When teaching poetry to middle school students, “ekphrasis” was often our go-to source of instant inspiration. Many kids freeze at open writing, and actively rebel against instructions (rightfully so), but when presented with an image, film, song, or other piece of art to write [...]

Introduction for October: Being Unreal I don’t know about you, but my right-now life is laden with reality: bills, the 9-to-5 (necessary to pay said bills), the leaden thing that weighs on everyone at said 9-to-5 (making them mean and me mean), family, the failures of family, a slowing metabolism and no will or energy [...]

Blitzkreig By John Gosslee Rain Mountain Press 2013 ISBN-13: 978-0989705110 70 pages The tree lay down on the garage roof and stretched. You have your heaven, it said, go to it. –William Carlos Williams, The Hurricane Maybe World War II ends earlier if white lab-coated William Carlos Williams scrawls “The Hurricane” longhand on the back [...]