A Sweet Unrest

Record Store Day

I want to give everyone plenty of notice. This Saturday, April 19th is Record Store Day, a day to celebrate independent record stores. Check out the website to get information about the indie stores in your area and see what they have planned. Many have djs and local bands lined up to play all throughout the day, as well as special sales and giveaways. It should be a really fun celebration.

Independent record stores are magic places, full of possibility and people who love music with a touching, intelligent insanity. There's nothing else quite like them on earth. They support local artists. They stock everything. They have great live performances. If you have something you don't like or are tired of, you can sell it and get something else. I love the convenience of iTunes as much as the next girl, but try doing that with a digital download. Plus, there are many, many great albums that are out of print and not available digitally. The youngsters may have a hard time believing me but it's true: there is a lot of good music out in the world that you can only find used. But most importantly, at your local indie you can talk to a real life person about music and no matter how much of a music geek you are, you can almost certainly get a recommendation for a band you'll love but never would have heard of otherwise. Tell me there isn't magic in that.

So go. Breathe in deeply that particular blend of dust, patchouli and obsession which can only be found at a used record store. Clatter your way through the cds (or vinyl!) and pick up a long-lost favorite or something completely new. You won't regret it.

Poetry Out Loud

I wanted to share this website I found. It's aimed at teaching students to perform poetry. You can listen to respected poets and actors (and Alyssa Milano, who impressed me) read some famous poems aloud. My favorite by a mile was Diane Thiel's reading of Yeats's 'When You Are Old'.

Let me know what you think if you get a chance to listen to any of the poems.

Prayer To Be With Mercurial Women

Here is a poem from the book Scottish Love Poems. This is a great collection selected by Antonia Fraser, based on her personal preferences and arranged loosely by type of love (Marriages, Love Lost, etc). This one by Roddy Lumsden stuck in my head the first time I read it. Fraser has it in the 'Unromantics' section...

Prayer To Be With Mercurial Women

Let me never have her father
call me, saying how's about
a round of golf? Instead, I'll take
the grim, forbidding monster
who inspects me for a crooked
trouser crease. And spare me too
from palmy evenings which sail by
in restaurants, on barstools,
without a storming off or two.
'Darling, you were made for me.'
I pray I'll never hear those words.
I need to feel I'm stealing
love another man would kill for.
When in sleep she curls herself
around me, may she whisper names
that are not mine. I'd prefer
to be the second best she's had.
A curse on mouths which dovetail
as if there's been a blueprint made:
I'd rather blush and slobber.
And once a month, please let me be
a punchbag. I'll take the blame
for everything: I want to taste
the stinging of a good slap.
I hope I'll find my begging notes
crumpled, torn in half, unread,
and when I phone, I want to hear
an endless sound of ringing.
Help me avoid the kind of girl
who means things when she says them,
unless she's screeching, telling me
exactly what I am. Amen.

I just like this one a lot. I don't know if it bears too much analysis- it seems pretty straightforward. My first thought was- how cool, a guy who would love all your worst traits. Who wouldn't want to hear the words, "I'll take the blame for everything"?. But of course it isn't so simple. I think the whole thing hinges on the line, "I need to feel I'm stealing/love another man would kill for." It seems our narrator is asking- praying- for a companion whose morals are as corrupt as his own. Terrible, right? But as I said, I like it.

Any thoughts?

There is an interesting interview with Lumsden here. I like the part where he talks about how he started writing as a boy.

I'll share more from the book in the future. I thoroughly enjoyed it and will definitely turn to it again and again. There are also several poets here whose work I want to investigate further.

Into The Parisian Underworld

I thought this might be of interest to my Francophile readers. I stumbled onto this website, Into The Parisian Underworld, which describes itself as 'A group blog dedicated to the reading and discussion of the unabridged version of Victor Hugo's Les Misérables.' What a cool idea and- how great is this- there is no reading schedule. You read at your own pace and write accordingly.

I am so tempted to join but since I have only recently dedicated my life to reading poetry I feel like I shouldn't take anything else on. But I can't swear that 'no' is my final answer...

Life/Lines

The Life Lines thing has, of course, gotten me thinking about my own life lines. None of mine are poetry yet since I just started reading it. Before poetry I had song lyrics to guide me. I didn't do too badly.

She summered every winter through a calendar from paradise.
A cheap dress up temp job, and a tan by cold fluorescent light.
'Anticipation' playing from a radio, it mocks her life
"I was here" she scribbles in the rest room proves she was alive.
All the working girls are fine. Sunlight shines.
Contemplating suicide or a graduate degree
Answers, "How's it going?" with,
"I feel sullen, I feel sullen, I feel seventeen."
-Working Girls (Sunlight Shines) by The Pernice Brothers

This song perfectly summed up for me what it felt like to be twentysomething, working in boring temp jobs. But I still love it. I think it is more universal- evoking the feeling of not being satisfied with your work or life, and knowing there has to be something else but having no idea what that is or how to get there. If you've never heard them, The Pernice Brothers have a bit of a Smiths thing going on, with the slightly depressive and/or biting lyrics backed by a bouncy tune. This is, believe it or not, a happy sounding song. Irresistible.

Now everybody wears the look
Of the child who wished to marry you
Who, knocking proudly on your door
Is greeted by your pretty wife
If this is life, make no mistake
It keeps the weary world awake.
-The World Awake by Prefab Sprout

The whole song is brilliant but I especially love this image, it's so specific and descriptive- can't you just see that innocent, crushed little face? And the last two lines are something you can say/sing over and over to yourself when need to keep a good perspective on things. Like at the DMV.

Love like a light
Let me see my secret places
Shine hard and bright
Set me free from airs and graces
Snuff out the dark and let me see
The part of you that's part of me
-High Class Music by Roddy Frame

I could go on forever. Instead, please share your own Life Lines here, be they poetry, song lyrics or bits of wisdom your mother whispered to you.

National Poetry Month

April 1st marks the beginning of National Poetry Month. I'm not sure what that means for any of us. I've always worked in and haunted libraries and bookstores, and I know I must have walked by many National Poetry Month posters and displays without even registering them. I may even have set a few up. So I guess I'm saying that I question how effective this kind of thing is, if the point is to bring new poetry fans into the fold.

On the other hand, I am taken with poetry now and I do love a celebration. Something like this is probably better than nothing. And there are some nice events planned. I'm really touched by this 'Life/Lines' page where people share their favorite lines and explain why they mean so much to them.

And this may be helpful for finding events that celebrate poetry in your area.

In Attridge's book he recommends having someone else read a poem aloud to you as a way to get a better feeling for it's rhythm. I think that would be a really good way to celebrate National Poetry Month- find someone to read a poem aloud to you.