Friday, May 13, 2022

One of the odd things about a blog is how an old post can suddenly get an unexpected burst of interest, for no apparent reason whatsoever. While my commentary on “The Fiftieth Anniversary of ‘The Last Time’ ” has intermittently drawn the attention of readers now and then, the traffic report for that article alone has never before hit almost 30 readers in a two-day period (May 12-13, 2022). From the very start, my blog has never been one to attract much attention; for one thing, I refuse to stick to a single subject with a precise point of view that keeps hammering away at the same ideas. If I want to write about a novel by Jim Krusoe, I do so with the same commitment that I write about the ideological limits of Bernie Sanders as a presidential candidate, bringing the song that Sanders used in one of his advertisements (Paul Simon’s “America”) into the discourse. If I want to write a long, two-part entry on public transportation (“The New Covenant of Public Mobility”), and then give my attention to some quirky thing that’s happened in my life or to a film that my CSULB colleague Steve Cooper was involved in, then I regard that as the birthright of this blog: no one’s paying me to write this, so I get to write what I want. Sometimes people write me with additional questions, as has been the case with my entry on Sam Shepard’s first known script, “The Mildew.”

Since writing my post on “The Last Time,” a several hour film has been released on the Beatles and the recordings they made at the end of their time as a group. It’s a shame that an equivalent amount of footage doesn’t exist of the Rolling Stones in the mid-1960s as they made “The Rolling Stones Now,” “Out of Our Heads,” “Aftermath,” and “Between the Buttons.” While there are at least an additional half-dozen songs on which Jones’s contributions are crucial (such as “2000 Light Years from Home”; and “No Expectations”), those four albums are among the very best made by any group in the 1960s, and they had a mesmerizing influence on many poets as well as a culturally contextualizing impact that lingers to this day. While Charlie Watts’s assessment of Jones is all too true (“He had a death wish at a very early age”), it’s also the case that the music Jones made still sounds audaciously resonant.

How to Jump from a Moving Train

Oriana Ivy’s new collection of poems, How to Jump from a Moving Train, has just been published by CERVENA BARVA. (The name of the press means “red color” in Czech, to honor the Czech descent of the publisher, Gloria Mindock). While many poets are hard at work on verse that protests the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and their voices certainly deserve attention, Oriana Ivy’s book has a historical plasticity that is rare in being so timely in its conjuncture with current events. THIS IS THE BOOK TO READ TO UNDERSTAND THE NUANCES OF THE ONGOING CONFLICT IN EUROPE.

http://www.cervenabarvapress.com

I love these poems. Each one is astounding, a whole treasured world unto itself, rendered in language that’s been honed and polished until it shines. There’s an intimacy in this work that keeps opening out – from the deeply personal into something enormous, not grandiose but so human that it hurts, it blesses, it heals.
-Cecilia Woloch, author of Tzigan, Sacrifice, Carpathia, Earth and Late

Amongst the tens of thousands of poets at work in the United States in the twenty-first century, there are still a handful who began writing well before the Berlin Wall came down. How long ago that seems! Though Oriana Ivy’s poems are embedded in the playing out of European history after World War II, they speak to the crisis that is at the heart of the “ghetto of time.” With a poet as reticent as Oriana Ivy to be visible within the horde of contemporary working poets, it’s hard to know exactly how many poems she has written that are as fine as the ones in this collection. Several dozen more? Two hundred more? No matter. These poems alone would serve to preserve any poet’s name on the reading list of every astute lover of poetry.
-William Mohr, author of The Headwaters of Nirvana: Reassembled Poems and Holdouts: The Los Angeles Poetry Renaissance 1948-1992

Here is a video that will you a sneak preview of its contents:

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On Tuesday, May 3, 2022, 1-2 PM, seven poets, writers, and beloved close friends of Holly Prado (1938-2019), read selections from her luminous poetry, on Harry’s Poetry Hour, Creative Chaos MPTF. Featured readers included Alison Townsend, Cecilia Woloch, Laurel Ann Bogen, Barbara Crane, and Susan Hayden, as well as Phoebe MacAdams, Cecilia Woloch, and the James Cushing, three of the founding members of Cahuenga Press, the poets cooperative that issued Prado’s poetry during the last quarter-century of her life.

Thanks to Jennifer Cllymer, Director, MPTF Studios, & to the Creative Chaos Team.

Here is the link to the tribute:

May 11, 2022

The following is meant to be a parody of an act worked up by an outfit called “Breaking Balls.” Ny guess is that a few readers will take it seriously, thereby proving that one of their best friends is a SUG, which is analogous to “Be a Man” in the same way that Homo sapiens and Neanderthals share congruent features, aspects, and talents.

Be a SUG (Stand Up Guy) — But Don’t Be a Toxic SUG.

Don’t like betting on something you weren’t coordinated enough to play in high school? Ask the bartender what beer tastes best to the average SUG.

When your best friend’s mother dies unexpectedly, don’t send a sympathy card purchased at a drug store. A text message less than 10 words long will do. Be a SUG.

Don’t know what a point spread is, but know how to calculate time and alcohol intake down to the ounce. You’re a SUG with a car that will never be impounded.

Want to prove your SUGness, but don’t want to be toxic about it? Quote imaginary liner notes from a Miles Davis album.

Can’t get a hard-on anymore? Don’t take Viagra. Let it droop. Be a SUG.

Memorize at least 5000 statistics in three different professional sports over the past century. Be a SUG.

Wake up at 2:00 a.m. on a workday to watch the quarter-finals of the World Cup, even though you don’t know what a penalty kick is. Be a SUG.

Bored with porn? Too poor to afford a hooker? Use your fantasy life. Be a SUG.

Make fun of your penis size, even though it’s perfectly average. Be a SUG.

Never been to Vegas? Don’t know how to play blackjack? Just lie. Be a SUG.

Don’t hesitate to make the same mistake five times in a single week because it makes a good story to bore your friends with. Be a SUG.

In a hurry because you left late and you’re behind a slow driver? Don’t use your rear-view mirror when changing lanes. Be a SUG.

Wear a tight t-shirt and rub one of your nipples to show your girl friend you think she’s sexy. Be a SUG.

Worried about your bank balance? Carry only enough cash to buy a six pack. Be a SUG.

When asked to watch a friend perform at a slam poetry contest, don’t say you need to work out at a kick-boxing gym. Instead, use him as a warm-up. Be a SUG.

When a neighbor asks if you have jumper cables, tell him they stopped working after your dominatrix returned from a Halloween party. Be a SUG.

Only use your rear view mirrors at night when there are no headlights behind you. Be a SUG.

Don’t let anyone ever call your bluff. Admit you’re faking it before you start pretending to be other than what you are. Be a pain-in-the-ass SUG.

In terms of artists who are trying to get their work out in public, the pandemic was especially unfortunate to artists who had just received their MFAs in 2019. Evie Erickson, for instance, had just finished at California State University, Long Beach, less than a year before it broke out. Her first chance to show a collection of the work done since then is at a small venue in Long Beach and worth your attention.

“SHORE BLOOMS” will be up at Artistic Edge and Framing until June 11, so you still have a month to visit a small section of Long Beach that makes living here worth enduring on a day when the wind ameliorates the air quality. For those who don’t live locally, there are worthwhile spots to drop in on. In fact, I would recommend starting your visit to this neighborhood with a visit to the best political bookstore in Los Angeles County (PAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE).

If you’re visiting on Wednesday through Sunday, your quick food choices include grabbing a delicious treat at GUSTO bakery or heading to Coyote Pizza for a little lunch before you drop in at the gallery.

When you get home, fix a cup of tea and have a virtual stroll through an exhibition that Linda Fry has a painting in:

https://artspaces.kunstmatrix.com/en/exhibition/10082162/bluehen

May 7, 2022 — The Day before “Mother’s Day”

The confirmed rumor that the Supreme Court is about to overturn Roe versus Wade has set those who support feminist civil right into accelerating conflict with the “right to lifers.” The latter constitute a minority of the U.S. population, though the U.S. Constitution’s distribution of political power allows them to impose their religious beliefs on the majority. The story of how so-called “democracy” became a matter of “minority manipulation” starts with a national constitution entirely written by men, many of whom not only owned slaves, but felt free to impregnate them whenever the mood struck them. That those who oppose a woman’s civil rights depend on their nostalgia for the political power of the “founding fathers” says everything about their ideological imperatives.

The hypocrisy of almost all “right to lifers” is monumental in its historical scope. The fact remains that those who supported the bombing of villages in Laos and Cambodia during the U.S. Vietnam War make up a sizable contingent of those opposed to Roe Vs. Wade. This political faction sees no contradiction whatsoever in their ideology. American empire and the evisceration of women’s civil rights go hand in hand. I have no doubt that conservatives would love to keep these issues separate, but I for one cannot accept the feasibility of pretending that life is precious and must be honored in every form when those opposed to abortion and birth control have signed off for decades and decades, with no compunction whatsoever, on a military budget devoted to killing children.

Do not pretend otherwise.

How many of those who oppose abortion have spoken up in any way whatsoever about the recent cold-blooded execution of children by one of American’s “allies”? If you want to believe that a fertilized egg inherently deserves the full protection of every government’s legal resources, then the U.S. Constitution gives you the right to mount arguments in favor of your cause. Please don’t insult me, though, by being utterly indifferent to the murder of children by military forces whose prowess depends on money derived from taxes you have paid.

For you to become vehement about the rights of the unborn and then pretend that you are not complicit with the murder of several dozen women and children in Mandatah Village in Afghanistan recently only demonstrates that your so-called idealization of human reproduction is only about the patriarchal control of women’s lives. As for the collateral damage generated by the billions of dollars of military aid given to countries such as Pakistan, you are more than happy not only to pick up the financial tab, but the moral one as well.

If you are against abortion, you could begin to convince me of your sincerity by getting on an airplane and figuring out some way to restore Qudratullah’s world to him. While en route, you might want to ask yourself how many people people in the U.S. lost 27 family members in the World Trade Center terrorist attacks. Imagine such a family in the U.S. and what you would be willing to do on their behalf. Then once you get to Afghanistan, do the same for Qudratullash. I know I am asking a lot of you, but you have asked me for even more: to believe that you really care about the lives of the unborn when those who have been born have deliberately been targeted by those you have funded.

Why are expenditures so high for military in Pakistan?

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“The personal is political” has been a slogan of those on the Left for several decades. On a personal level, I have always been dismayed by the presumptuousness of conservative. I recall driving past a church that featured the pro-life retort: “Be glad your mother chose life.” It was hard not to laugh at such a fine example of dark humor. The insinuation that you should remember that you wouldn’t be here on Earth if your mother had chosen to abort her pregnancy is pathetically self-indulgent in its sentimentality.

“Be glad my mother chose life”? I prefer William Butler Yeats’s translation of some lines from “Oedipus at Colonus.”

“Never to have been born is best.
Never to have drawn the breath of life;
never to have looked into the eye of day.
The second best is a gay goodnight
and quickly turn away.”

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“Against abortion? Get a vasectomy.”

“If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament.”