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Saturday, July 30, 2005

CONGRATULATIONS TO SANDY MCINTOSH

whose new book, The After-Death History of My Mother, will be reviewed in the September/October issue of ForeWord, a magazine showcasing critical reviews and title trends exclusively from the independent publishing market. Their readership consists of over 20,000 librarians and chain store booksellers.

Friday, July 29, 2005

BLUE FIFTH REVIEW

's recently-released Summer Issue features poems by SUSAN TERRIS and EILEEN TABIOS. Click here (go to Section I: "Clenched Fists and Clouded Metaphors")!

Sunday, July 10, 2005

CONGRATULATIONS TO JACQUELYN POPE

whose poem "Mrs. Robinson" from her -- and our 2004 Marsh Hawk Press Prize award-winning book -- WATERMARK is featured today on "Poetry Daily"!

Friday, July 08, 2005

SPD RECOMMENDS TWO MARSH HAWK PRESS TITLES

in its latest message:

SPD RECOMMENDS: NEW TITLES for June 10—July 08, 2005
ORDERS: 1-800-869-7553

ORDERS@SPDBOOKS.ORG
FAX: 1-510-524-0852
WWW.SPDBOOKS.ORG
Try Electronic Ordering! SPD is on PUBNET (SAN #106-6617)
Questions? Contact Brent Cunningham at brent@spdbooks.org

I TAKE THEE, ENGLISH, FOR MY BELOVED
by Tabios, Eileen R.
$24.95 / paper / pp.504
Marsh Hawk Press, 2005
ISBN: 0-9759197-3-3
Poetry. Memoir. Asian American Studies. With I TAKE THEE, ENGLISH, FOR MY BELOVED, Eileen R. Tabios melds the forms of poem, memoir, art monograph, play, novel and questionnaire to affirm that the poet not only speaks English, but she loves English. From her love, she crafts poems denoting a unique vision, as well as other writings that transcend inherited literary forms. This collection ends with a close reading by Ron Silliman of one of Tabios' poems through which he concludes, "Tabios tries for more in one page than many other poets would attempt in 20. And she pulls it off."
http://www.spdbooks.org/details.asp?bookid=0975919733

SKINNY EIGHTH AVE
by Miller, Stephen Paul
$15.00 / paper / pp.128
Marsh Hawk Press, 2005
ISBN: 0-9759197-1-7
Poetry. "Stephen Paul Miller is either the Last Poet of the New York School or the First Poet of the New New York School. Probably both..Something more or less Post Modern, Post Post Modern, Post Everything. Finding something to live for in the pain is the joy of this poetry. The Millers, pere et fils, spread it over Everything"-Bob Holman. "Stephen writes his poems on an invisible surface that breathes and grows. It's like watching good poetry happen. It goes and goes. A little tense, but wonderful for it"-Eileen Myles
http://www.spdbooks.org/details.asp?bookid=0975919717

Wednesday, July 06, 2005

INDIANA REVIEW FEATURES THOMAS FINK

in its newly-released Summer issue devoted to collage! Congratulations to Tom, who also will be one of the featured poets at the Bay Area Poetry Marathon in San Francisco on August 27 (please check back on this blog for details closer to the reading).

ON EILEEN TABIOS' NEW BOOK

I TAKE THEE, ENGLISH, FOR MY BELOVED, poet-blogger offers the following commentary on

Michael Wells' Stick Poets Superhero Blog
Tuesday, July 05, 2005

Tabios Gift of Poetry better than any Toaster

Well I didn't realize it.... But I guess Eileen Tabios had a bit of an anniversary on June 30th. It was the tenth anniversary of the day she quit her banking career for poetry. Now if that seems trivial to some, I think it is not. After all, what are the odds that I would be reading a blog on banking or any of those gazillion other peeps ( Stick has lost count ) out there. Happy belated Eileen.

Speaking of Eileen, I have been reading in I Take Thee, English, For My Beloved somewhat often lately. It seems ( to me anyway) this book is difficult to just pick up and read through unlike Menage A Trois With the 21st Century. Don't get me wrong, The Brick, as it is often referred to is inspiring on several levels. One, it seems to layer so much into one complete book. Life, culture, politics, relationships, language, art, sex - have I missed anything? Second, it approaches poetry with innovation.

But seriously, lately I have been reading parts of it - some for the first time, some for - Oh I don't know, but certainly the umpteenth time. I keep trying to process this and let it speak to me. I think I'd like to try writing from some portions of it for prompts - like epigraphs.

I really have not blogged much about this book, though I have had a copy of it since I think March. Actually, I really have a lot of questions about it I'd like to pose Eileen. And maybe I will at some point soon.

I guess to go full circle on this post, I should say that I am glad that Eileen traded in here banking career for poetry. I don't know what kind of a banker she was, but she has been electric as a poet. Her energy, thought process as well as expression are all simply amazing. Trust me - I'd take one of her books over a toaster any day!

Meanwhile, I need to get back to The Brick.

Monday, July 04, 2005

SAMPLES OF 2005 WINNING POEMS

Ship of convicts and dreamers,
ship of exiled lovers and cosmographers,
ghost ship of my desire sailing
to the lands of Gog and Magog,
let me go with you, don’t spare me
the day, the hour, the precise
moment of your great discovery.
--from "The Jack-Tar's Song" by Sigman Byrd


Please go to the Marsh Hawk Press website link here for poems by 2005 Marsh Hawk Press Prize Recipient Sigman Byrd and finalists Robert Perchance and Mary Crow. These poems attest to the high degree of quality in the manuscripts submitted to the contest.

ON EILEEN TABIOS' I TAKE THEE, ENGLISH, FOR MY BELOVED

Ernesto Priego comments on Eileen Tabios' new Marsh Hawk book at his blog

NEVER NEUTRAL

::..BREATH..::
July 4, 2005

Still processing the Chatelaine's brick, I Take Thee, English, for My Beloved.

I took it to bed last night and dreamt with phrases like "desire/should never/be consigned".

While reading it, I became conscious that I was breathing. The poet, indeed, inspires.

I woke up this morning saying:

blueness
of sky--
I am breathing

Eileen breathes, and so do their poems. Her writing punches you in the face, but mostly in the chest, and frees you from some sort of oppression that had stopped you from breathing properly. Air.

Friday, July 01, 2005

BASIL KING ON ROBERT CREELEY

"The darkness surrounds us"

I've read Pound's first encounter with Henry James. H.D. on her first meeting D.H. Lawrence. Picasso's love for Henri Rousseau, and I've seen Red Groom's painting of Dekooning's and Rothko's accidental meeting in Washington Square. But to this day Franz Kline meeting Robert Creeley is one of the most beautiful things that I have ever witnessed.

Bob and I were drinking beer in one of the booths that lined the walls of the old Cedar Bar. Bob had recently moved back to the states and had stopped off in New York on his way to Black Mountain College. Bob was wearing the blue winter coat that Zukofsky had given him. He didn't have any money, and I had credit at the bar. It was late in the afternoon, and Franz Kline walked in and sat down next to me. Franz, meet Robert Creeley. Awe came over Kline's face. He shifted his weight, adjusted his brown hat, and took Bob's hands and held them. "I can't tell you how much your poetry means to me." Franz was still holding Bob's hands when Bob broke the silence. "Thank You."

"The darkness surrounds us."

Bob, you put a new light into the darkness, and we, that is all of us, thank you.

--Basil King
6.27.05

ON STEPHEN PAUL MILLER'S SKINNY EIGHTH AVENUE!

Poet-critic-blogger Jordan Davis offers the following commentary today (via his blog Equanimity) on Stephen Paul Miller's new collection, Skinny Eighth Avenue:

from EQUANIMITY:

So, I finished reading Stephen Paul Miller's Skinny Eighth Avenue on the A this a.m. I often have the feeling while I'm reading him that I'm alone in a huge auditorium wondering where everybody else is. He can be as funny -- funny -- as Lenny Bruce, and he's often as boring -- I mean profoundly boring -- as Jim Lehrer. If that math adds up to John Cage for you, too, then shouldn't you be wondering about now why you haven't looked into his oeuvre yet? Maybe you're familiar enough with SPM to categorize him as East Coast David Antin, maybe he buttonholed a friend of yours into a conversation on the street about Jasper Johns, Nixon, Francis Ford Coppola, and SeaWorld, and your friend showed up two hours late for your reading, drained, confused, and elated. Many many reasonable people have patiently explained to me that I am nuts for enjoying SPM's work.

We believe in unverifiable
Republican-owned-and-run Diebold machines
and the mere coincidence
of exit polls being
well within margins of error
in precincts not
using such machines
while Bush enjoys five percent bumps over exit polls
where Diebolds are used,
demonstrating faith in the hustle.
Hey, ya gotta believe.

I'm a Mets fan, so I don't read this as depressive postmodernism -- I read it as spontaneous metamodernism: watchful, angry, persistent, bemused. That's the word for the almost-too-associative quality of his work, bemused.

I think I'm just about ready to reread such SPM classics as "I Was on a Golf Course the Day John Cage Died of a Stroke" and Art Is Boring for the Same Reason We Stayed in Vietnam.

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