February 1st, 2008
WHEN FEBRUARY ARRIVES ON IT'S WINGS
February 3 WHAT DOES A MAN IN A CHICKEN SUIT REALLY HAVE TO SAY TO YOU ANYWAY? Calls from the Outside World by Robert Hershon I’m going to be honest. The thing that hooked me was seeing my name on the first page:
(from 'Calls from the Outside World') I guess this makes me narcissistic and shallow but either way it’s a good, conversational, opener and a decent parody of a stereotypical hook-line: you have to keep the reader interested, right? What better way than to say ‘something happened’ and italicise it? – Unless of course you get lucky and name a character after your reader.
(from 'Calls from the Outside World') This kind of slangy everyday talk characterises the collection. And I like what Robert Hershon is up to: pointless and trivial things do, however unreasonably or inexplicably, become catchphrases in a communal environment or relationship. Private shared interpretation attaching a specific occult meaning to a casual or banal phrase is one way of adapting language to deal with experiences of commonality and the interjections of the alien. You don’t need to be creating new language or syntax to ‘make it new’. You just need to reinterpret and relocate the language you’ve got already and create a kind of coterie, or readership, of mutual understanding. So far, so New York. But it implies exclusion too:
(from 'Calls from the Outside World') I wasn’t expecting the sardonic outburst of this final stanza. In a way it’s a welcome jolt but, while I can see how it relates to the others, I’m not sure this sort of sudden broad-brush social commentary improves the poem. It’s a long way to go in a short space, which, I suppose, kind of strengthens Hershon’s message, but maybe overbalances the poem, weighting it to teeter on the brink of polemic. (Or maybe I’m just grumpy because I’m feeling under the weather (aah), which might make up for seeing my name and being happy. So I’m balanced and objective again. Honest. Anyway:) The slang in the poem outlasts the present staff and takes on a disembodied life of its own. Private language divorced from its original context becomes dangerous by emphasising separateness, creating a sense of ‘an elite’ based entirely on a banal accident. That conclusion, delivered as it is wittily and conversationally, is enough for me without the final stanza. I love the second poem, ‘Chicken Suit’
but I’m not going to say any more about it. What’s not to like? And this free-wheeling style is the backbone of the collection. Hershon’s laconic voice is well-suited to the delivery of sharp shocks of observation and absurdity, often combined with deft touches of imaginative humour:
(from 'Olives') But there is a knowing quality to the writing that can grate a little, as it does here, when the author starts on about the process of writing:
(from 'Olives') On the whole though, I’m carping and fault-finding, which is probably not fair. Overall the collection made me feel happy. And it’s nice to feel happy, although there’s not much clever you can say about it. Except that in spite of the fact this is apparently Hershon’s twelfth collection he’s retained an enviable playfulness, as well as a confidence about using small subjects without always feeling the need to magnify them into symbols of something grander, that throws his moments of seriousness into relief (or vice versa depending on your tastes). And I love the feeling of happy-to-be-alive-in-spite-of-it-all that comes through. OK, there’s nothing technically astounding here. The use of line-breaks is great, but that’s about all you can say. Who cares? This is poetry that makes you glad to be the kind of person who reads poetry. And how often can you say that?
February 7 THE YEAR OF THE RAT, AND IT'S COMPETITION TIME!
We got to talking, and sometimes when I talk with Twill it’s remarkably like talking to myself. It’s almost exactly the same mixture of wisdom and stupidity. He makes me laugh, and I make him laugh, and then we console ourselves for our sadnesses, and round off the event by rubbishing a few poets we’re not mad about to make ourselves feel better. Anyway, to cut a long story short (I can’t tell you about what he told me about his butcher and an elderly customer’s Chihuahua, much as I’d like to) our conversation turned to the not unusual question of why the bloody hell, and for how much longer. Do I have to put a question mark there? I can’t figure out if it’s a rhetorical question or not. Here’s one just in case? So. Anyway: Hence (a word I only use when the ‘Thus’ tin is empty): Entries are invited for a very exciting competition! This will be the first and last competition E&D will ever do, so enjoy the moment. There’s just one question, and (possibly) just one prize. The question is: What is the point of this website? (Background information: almost nobody looks at it. A few people I know look at it, and a few people I don’t know, but after that, who? why? I kind of enjoy doing it, although I wish I could be bothered to be ruder to people sometimes, but there’s other things I enjoy that I don’t do – well, not very often, anyway – so my personal enjoyment is not really an issue.) Entries should be posted as a "Comment". I'm not expecting lots, so I'm sure not to be disappointed. The prize is: ........ actually, this has yet to be determined. If anyone can come up with an answer that makes sense, beyond the ones I’ve already thought of and thrown into the garbage, I’ll find something. I think I’m on pretty safe territory.
February 13 THE NEXT TIME I SEE LAURA VEIRS The first time I saw Laura Veirs play was at The Maze when “Carbon Glacier” had only been in the shops a little while and a buzz was just starting to be heard around mention of her name. I’d bought the record almost as soon as The second time I saw Laura Veirs play was also at The Maze. I have no idea when it was, but I do know that it was another excellent show. There were more people there, but it wasn’t full. That time she'd been supported by one other musician on voice and guitar, and the sound of both had been filled out by some of that fancy electronic recording and looping gadgetry that lets you accompany yourself more than once, so one person can end up sounding like a whole group...... oh, I don't know how to describe it, it's all too technologistical for me ...... The third time I saw Laura Veirs play was also also at The Maze, and it was last night. The place was full. Very full. I wasn’t the only person to express surprise that she still plays such a small venue, where 150 or so is a a packed house, but on reflection I’m not complaining, because the intimacy of the place is ideal for her. She’s warm and chatty, and I’d rather see her there, where people listen and feel a part of something, rather than at somewhere like The Rescue Rooms, where half the time people just go because they’ve got nothing better to do. Veirs’s two most recent records -- "Year of Meteors" & "Saltbreaker" -- came out while I was in China, and I’ve only recently been able to catch up on them, along with lots of other catching up I’ve been trying to do. It strikes me that “Saltbreaker” is the stronger of the two, and not far off the quality of “Carbon Glacier”. But she wasn’t really plugging a record at this show. She didn't even have CDs for sale, because she'd sold out and was waiting for fresh supplies. She was just having a good time, playing solo, and playing songs from wherever the songs happened to come from. At one point she asked if there were any requests, and I did something I almost never do, which is shout out. And she played my request – “Rapture” is one of my favourite songs of all time. [Listen] No doubt.
February 15 FOR LOVE This is a collaborative poem, originally intended for Valentine's Day, but we got the date wrong. Our watch had stopped. Plus we were (to a man and possibly a woman) almost terminally bored by urchins trying to sell us single roses "for the lady". The contributors to this poem were (in no particular order, and in no particular degree of veracity) the bloke in Pancho's who's best at the kebabs, Mike Nesmith, a chap who's asked me on three successive Wednesdays at the bus stop outside the Victoria Centre if I can spare 90p so he can get to Derby, me ("Don't forget me"), Charlie Potatoes, Marlo Brandon, and the rather strange and somewhat scary person who loiters near the Trinity Square car park. He or she always has the appearance of going somewhere, and of having things to do, but it's also obvious that he or she has nothing to do except loiter. I leave you to figure out which bit of this he or she "contributed". Conchita! Sweetheart! Darling. Friend. Dream girl. Boy. Sakura Sakurada, Honey bunch of flowers. Mistress X. Babe. Part of my heart. Peachums.
February 18 ANNOYING CLEVER BITCH Sharon Mesmer is one my favourite people, and this is her new book. What's inside is as good as the cover. The first poem, the title poem, begins: You annoying diabetic bitch. I suppose I should say this is all flarf-type stuff. That's all I'm going to say. It's a thing of joy....... And this, boys and girls, is a bonus:
"Annoying Diabetic Bitch" by Sharon Mesmer is available from Combo Books, price $13.95. (This was the best link I could find; it seems pretty out of date, but go there and you are, at least, in the right neighbourhood. Anyways, you can always buy the book from Amazon..... Don't forget it's Mother's Day soon.
February 24 HERB ROBERT A poem by Andrew Bailey Herb Robert "Australian law is such that no-one can legally claim that the herb is a cancer cure. No scientific research has been done that shows it can cure any ailment." The great Dioscorides has already described it. It has this wide range of applications in the home is not unpleasant. Old-man's-pepper. Digestive, Fox Geranium. Yarroway. Cuckoo's Eye. Soldier's Woundwort. No insect pest bothers it. Hop O'my Thumb. Puck. Robin-I'th-Hedge Redshanks. Death-come-quickly. Don't. Saint Robert. © Andrew Bailey, 2008
February 26 IT'S A MUSIC DAY, I THINK So this morning I get up and I'm going to Birmingham for a meeting, otherwise called a lunch, but while I'm munching on my morning breakfast cereal I look at The Guardian online and read about Tegan & Sara and there are two reasons why I think I might like them: Neil Young likes them, their latest record is produced by one of the blokes from Death Cab for Cutie, and they are said to sound poppy. OK, three reasons. Half an hour later I have their new record on the computer and play it while I shower and get ready to go out. Yes, it's poppy and probably not the deepest or most original stuff you'll ever hear, but it's also very listenable when you're looking in the mirror trying to get your hair right.
The lunch was very nice, too. And all day, from the moment I walked out the door, while I was on the train to Birmingham, while I was at lunch, and while I was on the train home, I had the riff from Nick Cave's "Dig, Lazarus, Dig!" going through my head. It's a great riff, I think ....
February 29 LOOK OUT! IT'S MOTHER'S DAY! Although some people apparently never look at the sidebar, I've just put a couple of new bits of music on there. I know there's more music than poems on here sometimes, but that's because, well, you know.....
Other stuff happened today. When I went to the Post office to post a Mother's Day card to my, um, mother.... well, there was a woman getting cash from the cash machine next to the Post Office door, and she had a kid in a buggy pushchair thing, and the pushchair was right in front of the door, blocking the entrance. So I said "Excuse me, can you move the pushchair please?" and the woman looked at me like I was some kind of child-molesting-single-mother-raper and, frankly, to put it bluntly, she didn't move the pushchair. So I did. It didn't make her the happiest mother in the world, but .... What else happened today? Oh yeah..... I wrote this. I seem to have given up on poems of late, and taken to chunks of prose. I think I must be tired of figuring out the line-breaks. A visit to the hairdresser A gadget was on the street, abandoned by someone who had no love for such things. Electronically, the day began but ended unexpectedly because there was, let’s suggest, no interest. A hairdresser arrived at the shop and found people queueing, waiting. But where was the desire? As the street sweepers reached the end of their shift and turned homeward, some people were just waking up. This world is exquisitely so extremely full of difference.
VICTOR BORGE: "I THOUGHT YOU WERE BLEEDING" I've got a cold, so I'm pissed off, but to cheer myself up (and I hope to brighten your day too) here is something that cheers me up. Oh, I don't know, but I just re-discovered him and here he is. There's some more stuff on YouTube if you feel like looking. This is comic genius, I think. and in case you look at this site and (I don't understand how, but if you) hate all the indie cool rock'n'roll music I love and put on here, here's some good solid old fashioned music for you: |